WizKid: Year Zero
by Joshua The Evil Guy
Summary: HP/Marvel Universe.  Harry Potter is a wizard.  He is also a mutant.  This is his first summer as both, the summer before he goes to Hogwarts.
1. Manifestation

Title: Harry Potter: Wizkid: Year Zero

Author: Joshua

Disclaimer: Marvel Universe will forever and for all time be the sole property of Stan Lee (and/or his Successor), while the HP Universe was written and created by JK Rowling, and since I am neither of those people, I don't get to make any money from this. I'm just doing it cause it's fun!

Summary: AU X-over HP / Marvel Universe. Harry Potter's a Wizard, Mutant, Student, and the Boy-Who-Lived. He has to deal with things from controlling his powers, learning magic, playing Quidditch, and keeping evil wizards, mutants, and aliens from killing him. Then his friends get involved, and things really get messy!

Author's Notes: This was inspired, partially, by the HP/X-Men crossover trilogy by "Harry Potter and the Children of the Atom by Classic Cowboy". A really good story worth reading, even if it goes so AU, I don't even bother reading it as anything but. Portions of this story also reflect my growing annoyance at everybody that immediately or 9 times out of 10 place Ron and the rest of the Weasleys as "pawns of Dumbledore" or "selfish, greedy purebloods that struck gold by being nice to Harry" and portray Ron as nothing but faults and Ginny as nothing but a slut. So, for a bit of flavor, I'm trying out the opposite end of the spectrum for once.

Year 0:

Harry James Potter was very sick the morning of the day that his life was changed forever. It wasn't the first time he'd been sick, in fact it was hardly surprising, since before he could remember, his Aunt and Uncle had put him in the cupboard under the stairs, and it wasn't exactly sanitary under there.

Still, he'd been having a nightmare, he couldn't remember what exactly, only that when he woke up, his scar had given him a few sharp pains, and his whole body felt like it was on fire, like the few times he'd had the flu over the years. Also, after the sharp pains had stopped, he was overwhelmed by a migraine-level headache that just did not go away. It certainly wasn't helped by his Aunt screaming for him to wake up and pounding on the door to his little cupboard.

"I'm up, I'm up!" he shouted through the door when she didn't stop immediately.

As always, in the summertime, after his Aunt had him cook them breakfast, during which he managed to sneak a piece of toast or a single strip of bacon, he was out in the garden weeding, mowing and taking care of the plants. The constant heat from the sun beating down on him certainly didn't help his migraine, but what made it really worse was both his Aunt and Uncle berating him, yelling at him, and doing basically what they'd done to him every single day of his life that he can truly remember.

His fat cousin Dudley added to the problem, but for the most part they didn't even bother talking to each other, and Harry was so little and scrawny, that he could often duck out of the way of his much fatter and all-around bigger cousin. In school, it was much worse, but they'd been out on "summer vacation" for a few weeks now, although for Harry, school was a much better vacation than it was for anybody else, since school at least got him away from the Dursley's for a a few hours a day.

Harry had finished all of the yard work, and was being watched through making them lunch, when the post arrived, and was rather rudely forced by Dudley and his Uncle to go get it for them. And that's when it happened. In sorting through the mail, not because he needed or wanted to, but because they would be shouting at him until Uncle Vernon had his paper, Aunt Petunia had her magazines, and the bills were all on the bottom. It was in this reorganizing of the stack that he came across a single envelope that stunned the young boy into stumbling a bit before reaching the kitchen. He held it like it was pure gold and would fly away if he let it go.

_Mr. H Potter_

_The Cupboard Under The Stairs_

_4 Privet Drive_

_Little Whining_

_Surrey_

It was a letter addressed to him.

It was folded up in heavy parchment, not thin white paper like what most people used, and the writing on it was in a pretty green ink. On the back was a unique crest with a large H in the middle, and four animals around it on all sides. It was the most wonderful thing Harry had ever seen.

He was so stunned by what he now held that he did not really register the fact that he had continued walking and had already dropped the mail off in front of his Uncle and returned to his seat, quiet as a whisper. Dudley very rarely ever took his eyes off the TV while he was eating, so Harry was quite surprised when his fat cousin actually had enough awareness to grab the letter out of his hands and start screaming.

"Mum! Dad! The _freak's_ got a letter!"

"Give that back!" Harry yelled immediately, a rage the likes of which he had never felt before tickling his insides. It wasn't too surprising, since he very rarely had anything for Dudley to take from him.

"What's this?" Uncle Vernon grabbed the letter from his son and stared at it, frowning. "Who would send _you_ a letter...?" The man's voice trailed off as he went startling pale, staring at the crest on the back of the parchment. "P-p-pet... Petunia...?"

She walked over, somewhat alarmed at her husband's reaction, until she saw the letter the same as he and looked like she was about to faint, vomit, and scream herself hoarse all at once.

"That is _my_ letter! Give it back!" Harry yelled, knowing from experience that logic never worked with these people, so hoping if he made enough of a nuisance of himself, they would give it to him just to shut him up. So far, it didn't seem to be working.

"Get out!" Uncle Vernon screamed at him. "Everyone, OUT NOW!"

Dudley, always able to recognize the danger signs of when he was about to get in trouble, left immediately, taking his food with him to the living room to watch TV in there. Harry, who would have been glaring his uncle down until he was either given his letter or shoved out the door, instead was clasping his head in pain, as his migraine had just jumped from 'bad headache' to '_actual_ migraine' and it was all he could do not to moan out loud.

He marshaled his reserves however, and managed to glare back at his Uncle, his anger and rage driving him on. "Give me back my letter!" he screamed.

"I SAID GET OUT!" the large man made to shove the boy down and drag him out, but just before he could touch the small boy's body, he was shocked by something, like static electricity. "OW! What...?"

Harry was trembling now, all in an effort to keep from exclaiming his pain. The aching pins and needles he'd felt since this morning flared up to a whole other level, making him wonder if this is what it felt like to be burned alive, but that didn't matter so long as he could still stand up. His anger and mounting rage at his mistreatment at the hands of these so-called relatives, drove him further than he'd ever thought he'd go before. The fact that the migraine made almost everything else white noise helped a bit.

"GIVE ME MY LETTER!" he screamed, moving closer to his Aunt and Uncle, holding out his hand.

When they retreated a step, he wondered what would make them do that, until he caught something out of the corner of his eye. A spark. No... an electric arc, like that lightning ball that Dudley had, when you touched it the lightning touched your fingers. Only... it was coming from him?

It didn't matter, they still hadn't given him his letter, and Harry was, quite frankly, so used to weird stuff happening around him that he waved it off as nothing for now. He took another step and he noticed that everything metal or electric or able to hold a charge sparked and shot a bolt of electricity towards him. He didn't feel anything but the pain of his body and the white noise in his head. He also began to notice that a bluish-white haze began to appear around him. It still didn't matter.

"GIVE! ME! MY! LETTER!" he screamed so loud that it echoed back at him.

The bolts of electricity that didn't hurt, shot at him again, only this time the haze around him became a wavy aura that kinda looked like flames, or 'electric fire' he'd seen one time in a documentary at school. Despite the odd and emotional circumstances, his mind chose then to recall that such phenomenon was not actually electricity, but a low-level, natural occurring form of what's known as plasma.

So he was surrounded by plasma, his head hurt, his body ached, and his relatives were making him angrier and angrier the longer they denied him. Although the looks of sheer terror on their faces was very pleasant to see, he had to admit.

"I said," he growled darkly, "GIVE ME MY LETTER!"

Suddenly, Uncle Vernon's face twists from terror and fear, to the same rage and anger Harry was feeling, and then he did something he really shouldn't have. He tore the letter in half.

Stunned, Harry just stared, unable to move, to think, to do anything but just stare at the one thing that had been given to him freely by somebody he did not even know... and now it was... gone. Destroyed by the tormentors of his life. He glared back up at Vernon Dursley, never again to call this man his Uncle. The physical pain was gone, not that it even held a candle's worth against the emotional pain that was tearing through him right then.

The plasma surrounding him went from 'electric fire' into a blinding blue-white flame that Harry surmised is what _real_ plasma is supposed to look like. Everything electrical around him suddenly exploded, the air grew hot, the floor beneath his feet starting to scorch and smolder. Vernon and Petunia Dursley cowered, hiding their eyes from the blinding light, and crying out at the heat and smell of the air. Harry couldn't see or hear any of that. All he felt, all he knew was the pain of having everything taken away from him by the people that should've loved him and taken care of him!

"!" Harry cried inarticulately in rage.

Outside the home, the neighbors had heard the screaming, and while it was rare, they'd heard it all before. Now, however, something was different. When they saw flashes of light coming from the kitchen, they wondered. When the flashes turned to a blinding strobe that came out of every window of the house, they grew concerned. When the kitchen blew up and the back half and side of the house exploded, they called the police.

_Elsewhere_

Professor Charles Xavier opened his eyes. He was sitting in the private room dedicated to the completely unique computer known as _Cerebro_, having been connected to it for a little over an hour now, just running diagnostics mostly, but also keeping an eye out on things. Cerebro, you see, was the only computer in the world that can identify every single mutant on the planet, but even then, only when linked with the mind of the most powerful psychic on the planet.

Known to his X-Men as Professor X, he quickly removed his helmet and placed it back on its stand before turning and directing his specialized wheelchair to take him out of the room. Already, he was using his mutant gift of telepathy to contact those he needed to meet with as soon as possible.

_'Phoenix, Cyclops, Wolverine, Beast, Banshee, Nightcrawler, Shadow Cat, Colossus. Meet me in the War Room, at once_.'

_'What is it Professor?'_ Jean Grey 'Phoenix' Summers asked back in the same method.

_'I'll explain shortly. Also, prep the jet for supersonic flight. We don't have much time.'_

By this point, he had already made it down the hall and entered the War Room himself, the fully-equipped tactical and command center based in the underground home beneath the X-Mansion. When he felt that all his 'students' were on their way, he began pulling up the information he'd need from Cerebro onto the tactical map, a holographic piece of technology lent to them by some friends.

Once most of them were in the room, the Professor answered Jean's original question verbally for the sake of those that were uncomfortable with telepathic communication.

"I've discovered a new mutant with Cerebro, one who just manifested. He's powerful already, and barely even 11 years old. His psychic signature was powerful enough that, despite the fact he's an ocean away, I was able to pull many details of his life from his mind during his... tantrum," Charles explained.

On the holographic map, it was zooming in on England, just outside of London. Thanks, in part, to the combined efforts of Beast and Shadow Cat, they were able to combine maps and radar read-outs with live satellite imagery, so when it zoomed in on 4 Privet Drive, they weren't seeing a dot on a map, but the current status of the house, and how the back half of it had been turned into a blackened crater.

"Tantrum, huh?" Wolverine grunted while taking a drag from his cigar. "My kinda kid."

"Needless to say," Professor X continued, "he's extraordinarily powerful, both in his mutation and mentally. If even half of what happened to him that I gleaned from his mind when his powers manifested here is true, he has been through enough without having to deal with the blame for something like this. As you can see, the police are already on their way, and after his... display, the boy was knocked unconscious, so he's still there. We can deal with the complications later on, but right now we need to get to him."

"Banshee, Colossus, Nightcrawler, Shadow Cat, I know you were just here for a few days, but right now this must become a priority. Go with Beast and Wolverine. Stop off at the Avengers, and pick up Scarlet Witch. Wolverine, in accordance with our agreement with the Avengers at times like these," everyone knew he was referring to the 'International Incident' from a few days previously that had the Avengers on High Alert and all active members ready to deploy at a moments notice, "you'll be staying in Wanda's stead on their team."

"Excuse me, Charles," Hank 'Beast' McCoy interrupted, "but is it truly so necessary to take Wanda with us? If it's just retrieving the boy so he does not come to any harm, why not just send Kurt and Kitty in a jet?"

"Unfortunately, I can't explain my reasonings just yet, as I have several things I must confirm first," Charles answered. "Mostly, this is just all precautionary. Furthermore, don't bring him back here, take him straight to Muir Island. I'll be contacting Moira right after you leave so she'll be expecting you."

"I'm sorry, Professor," Scott 'Cyclops' Summers spoke up. "But I just don't understand. Why are you so up in arms about this one mutant? Just how powerful is he?"

"It's not all about how powerful he is, Scott," Charles replied. "Though that most certainly is part of it. This much precaution actually comes from _who_ this young man is."

"Who is he?" came the expected question.

"Harry Potter."

TBC...


	2. Rescue

_Avengers Mansion_

"This is all highly irregular," Steve 'Captain America' Rogers argued as he watched Wanda 'Scarlet Witch' Maximoff board the X-Men's _Blackbird_ hypersonic jet. "And couldn't you leave behind Beast instead?"

"Nice to see you too, bub," Wolverine growled, puffing out smoke in the blond man's face.

"Are you quite certain Charles said the boy's name is _Harry Potter_? And he lives in England?" Wanda asked her fellow X-Men rather than reply to Captain America.

"Yes," Beast replied. "What is so important about him anyway? According to Cerebro's read-outs, he's barely an Alpha-Class mutant, and while that's impressive for a 10-year-old, this kind of response is rather surprising. Who is Harry Potter anyway?"

"He saved the European Wizarding World and Magical Community when he was just a one-year-old," Wanda replied as the _Blackbird_ took to the air and started flying across the Atlantic at several times the speed of sound. "Ten years ago, there was an evil wizard, calling himself the Dark Lord who was terrorizing the entire magical community. Everyone that was ever sent against him died, or worse. If he decided to kill you, you were dead, and anyone that got in his way too."

"Why wasn't something done?" Kurt 'Nightcrawler' Wagner asked.

"He was a wizard," Wanda pointed out. "Not a mutant, not a superhuman terrorist, and not really interested in declaring his intentions on national news. Didn't help that the magical community was terrified of him, so much so that even those that aren't so much a part of it find fear in saying his name. They all refer to him as 'You-Know-Who' and 'He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named' and things like that. He was _that_ much of a threat, but worse was that he still managed to stay in hiding so nobody could actually confront him or anything."

"So what's this got to do with the kid? This... Harry Potter?" Katherine 'Shadow Cat' Pryde asked.

"Ten years ago, on Halloween, nobody knows the real reason why, but this Dark Lord decided to show up and kill the infant Harry Potter. Nobody _really_ knows what happened that night, but the end result is well-documented." Wanda took a deep breath and continued. "He tried to kill Harry, but instead, Harry lived, and the Dark Lord has not been seen or heard from since. Harry Potter, after the night he lost his parents, became known to the entire magical community as the 'Boy Who Lived' and represented the end of a reign of terror that had gripped most of Europe for years. At the age of one, this boy we're going to retrieve, saved the world."

"Damn, now ah'm jealous," Sean 'Banshee' Cassidy commented.

"Don't be," Wanda reproached him. "We're heroes because we choose to be, Sean. We make the choice to do the right thing, and we understand the sacrifice required, and most of us can handle that. Harry's parents were slaughtered in front of him by a madman, and then he was sent off to live with relatives that have nothing to do with his magical heritage. Nobody should have to go through what he has."

"Well, we'll just have ta see about changin' his luck around a bit, won't we lass?" the red-haired Irishman gave her a wink. Wanda rolled her eyes and sighed.

"I suggest we start with figuring out how best to retrieve young Mister Potter," Beast spoke up after they crossed into Britain's air space. "Seeing as his house is now surrounded by the constables. Activating the cloaking device."

"I could always pull out my ole' Interpol badge, pull a quick snatch'n'grab on'em," offered Sean.

"If they haven't left him out in the open, I could 'port him out of there," Nightcrawler suggested.

"I cannot use my magic here, not with this being Harry Potter. The Ministry of Magic," she paused at the looks she received and quickly explained, "the 'government' of the local magical community, would be all over us faster than we could get away. Plus, no way of getting away with the boy undetected the other ways."

"I'm open to suggestions," Beast commented as he kept the invisible _Blackbird_ hovering a full kilometer over the destroyed house.

"Give me a second," Kitty said as she grabbed a pair of binoculars. Then she phased her entire upper body through the floor of the jet and stayed there for a few seconds before pulling back up. "He's still in the crater, the police are staying back and keeping everyone else the same, even the kids relatives. How far out are the rescue vehicles?"

"Scanning the radio now," Beast typed into a computer before quickly getting a result. "Ambulances are three minutes out, police are calling it a gas explosion. Hm... That's odd. Nobody is requesting any Rescue services, only the ambulance for the... Dursleys? I'm assuming them to be young Harry's relatives?"

Wanda could only shrug. "I live in America, Beast. While I keep up, I'm not obsessed with every detail about every wizard, no matter how famous, across the whole of Europe, let alone England!"

"If Kurt can get close enough to him, nobody would see them porting out," Kitty remarked. "The crater's pretty deep actually, almost a full meter from what I saw, sloping down, but the kid's right at the center."

"Do it, but quickly," Wanda ordered.

In a 'BAMF' of odorous smoke, Nightcrawler was gone, and two seconds later, he was back, carrying an unconscious ten-year-old boy in his arms, the boy's clothes badly scorched, but otherwise he appeared alive and healthy.

"And we're outta here!" Beast turned the hypersonic jet away from England and headed North to Muir Island as fast as he could move it, still under stealth.

"He's not hurt, but I did notice this scar on his forehead..." Kurt pointed out as he took the boy back to lay down on one of the few cots available in the advanced aircraft.

"That's where the Killing Curse hit," Wanda told them.

"Ah, right then." The rest of the trip to Muir Island was silent.

_Muir Island_

Harry didn't know where he was when he woke up. Now normally that might be understood, what with the disorientation and the events that happened before he almost literally blew himself up. He definitely remembered blowing part of the house up, but Harry had limited experiences in life, few of them included what many others took for granted, so when Harry woke up in someplace _other_ than the cupboard under the stairs, he really had no clue about where he was.

After realizing that he really didn't recognize the high ceiling, the white walls, or the _very_ comfortable hospital bed he was laying on, and that he really didn't know where he was, Harry considered being scared for all of two seconds before he realized that wherever he was, it wasn't in any place with the Dursleys, and that alone made it second only to Heaven.

Slowly, he sat up, and was pleased to note that his clothes had been changed from the over sized rags he'd inherited from Dudley, into clean cotton pajamas that actually fit! What he noticed first though was that his headache was gone, and his body was no longer aching. On second thought, maybe this really was Heaven.

The door to the room suddenly opened and Harry had to revise his statement yet again as he now _knew_ beyond a shadow of a doubt that this was Heaven, and he honestly couldn't care how he died, just glad that he wasn't in Hell with the Dursleys.

A young, beautiful auburn-haired woman wearing a white lab coat over a green sweater and khaki skirt walked through the door, carrying a clipboard with her. She couldn't have been a day over thirty from Harry's eyes, but what he immediately liked about her was kind dark eyes. He very rarely saw such kind eyes.

"Hullo there," she spoke in an Irish brogue accent. "Ah'm Doctor Moira MacTaggert."

"Uh, hullo," he greeted her back in his own English accent, "I'm Harry Potter. Uh, if it's not too rude... where am I? And how did I get here?"

She smiled at him, and Harry swore to pinch himself if she actually answered that he was in Heaven.

"Tis not rude at all, young'un. This is the Xavier Research Center on Muir Island. Tell me, what tis the last thing ye can remember?"

Harry shrugged, frowning a bit as he debated exactly how much to tell her. Despite her kind eyes, if he told her what he thought happened, she'd probably think he was crazy. He certainly wasn't far off from believing so anyway.

"Tis all right, Mister Potter. Perhaps ah should clarify, this Research Center? Tis for mutants."

Harry blinked, then did a double-take as what she was saying sunk in. He took a moment to sit back and observe his own reaction to the fact that he was more than likely a mutant. His first reaction, sarcastic amusement at the sheer irony of it.

Laughing once, he said aloud, "Figures. After all the years they called me on it, turns out I really am a freak. They must be so proud."

Moira frowned and the kindness in her eyes shifted to righteous anger with the ease of long practice. "Now see here young man! Being a mutant is _not_ something freakish or sub-human or anything of the sort! Now ah'll not have anyone here, under my care or not, say anythin' of that nature, d'ya hear me?"

"Uh, right. Sorry," Harry cringed a bit at the Irishwoman's anger.

Moira hadn't been expecting that, especially the way the boy cringed at her raised voice. Carefully, she made a few notes to her datapad, before looking up and asking again, "What tis the last thing ye remember, Mister Potter?"

Harry just shrugged again, but this time he answered, "My Aunt and Uncle tearing up my letter, then me being surrounded by a bunch of plasma that looked like electricity, right before I blew up the house."

"Letter?" she repeated, noting the way he'd said it, she figured it must have been very important.

Harry just nodded at her and said, "Only letter I've gotten in my whole life, and they took it. Never really had much in my life before now, they didn't exactly give me a lot, but the first thing I ever really got... they took it away. So, please understand why it is I'm not exactly broken up about blowing up the house, though if I know the Dursleys, they'll have me fixing it up for them the next time they see me."

Moira frowned, but this time the anger in her eyes was not directed at Harry.

"Harry... did they... well, did yer relatives... did they...?" she couldn't actually get the words out.

"They didn't really hurt me all that often, and yes, I do know what you mean. But there's no love lost between us, and I'm only related by blood to Aunt Petunia. Vernon can go bugger himself for all I care," he practically snarled.

Moira simply nodded, making a few more notes to her datapad.

"Is there anything ah can get fer ye, Harry?" she asked after a long moment. "Are ye hungry?"

"Starving actually," he admitted with a bit more enthusiasm than what she'd seen from him yet.

"Ah'll bet," she muttered.

"Tell ye whot, ah'll see what we can scrounge up fer a growin' boy like ye, get some food into ye, and then we'll make sure yer still healthy. After that, we'll need to have a talk, all right?" Harry just nodded.

"How did I get here, by the way?" he asked before she could leave all the way.

She turned and smiled at him, answering, "That, Mr. Potter, is one a the things we'll be talkin' about."

As soon as she left the room, Moira's idling anger throttled up to a full-blown rage as she stomped down the hall to the briefing room where most of the X-Men were waiting for her report on Harry Potter. Though they were expecting her, obviously most of them did not anticipate her storming into the room shouting out in Gaelic swear words that had Sean wincing every other word, and tearing around the room in a furious pacing frenzy that had the lot of them tracking her movements like a cat staring at a dog, waiting for it to pounce.

Finally after she'd calmed herself enough, Charles Xavier, who had taken a more direct, yet slower flight than the rest of his X-Men, asked her, "Moira, is everything with Mister Potter all right?"

"All right? ALL RIGHT! Charles, if they weren't already in police custody, ah'd march right over ta those soddin' bastards and kick'em where the sun don' shine until they're not even recognizable anymore! They might never have laid a hand on the boy, but ye shoulda seen the way he reacted when ah yelled at him for callin' himself a freak! Right now those... those... those _Dursleys_ are just damn lucky ah'm not a mutant and don't have powers meself!"

"They couldn't have known he was a mutant, he only just manifested _today_!" Kitty argued.

"They didn't," Wanda replied. "As I said, after the death of his parents, he was sent to blood relatives that have nothing to do with the magical community at all. Quite obviously, the reasons for this seem to be because of their prejudice and hatred, but not towards mutants. But to the magical community."

"So they didn't hate Harry fer bein' a mutant, but because..." Moira started to ask, startled.

"Because he's a wizard," Wanda finished for her.

"Saints preserve us," Moira slipped into stereotypical Irish-speak for a minute at the revelation.

"Professor," Beast addressed their leader, "You said earlier, when you sent us to retrieve young Harry, that he was extraordinarily powerful, and not just with his abilities. Were you referring instead to his magical potential?"

"No Beast," Charles answered. "I was alluding to the fact that Mister Potter is not only strong willed and a very determined individual, he does not hate nor does he allow his... blood relations to influence him in anyway, except perhaps to be a much better person than all of them. So, to appease that glare you're giving me, Moira, I do have _some_ idea of exactly what Harry's been through."

"Ah don't suppose ye'd care to know what it was that set him off like that, enough that his powers manifested in the way they did, I mean? His... _Mister_ _Dursley_ tore up Harry's letter right in front of him. While he didn't say it outright, from the way he spoke and his reaction, ah'd say that letter was literally the _only_ letter he's received in his entire life. Now ah wasn't exactly swimmin' in pen pals when ah was ten-years-old meself, but not even a _Christmas card_, or a _Birthday card_?"

"Given that Harry is a wizard, my assumption would be that the letter in question was his acceptance letter to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry," said Wanda.

"In other words, a part of his inheritance, his legacy, passed down from his parents?" Moira raged.

Wanda nodded meekly, but it was enough to send the Irish doctor tearing through the place again.

"And that... that... _homo sapien_ just tore it up right in front of him like that?"

"Wow, didn't know anybody that could turn those words into the most vulgar insult I've ever heard," Kitty shivered.

"Ye haven't spent much time around Moira when she gets all up in her ire, have ye?" Sean whispered.

"Why would I want to?" Kitty whispered back.

"What are we going to do?" Nightcrawler asked from his upside-down position above the table.

"Well, first things first, I suggest somebody get Mister Potter something to eat, and keep him company for a time. After that, we need to fully determine exactly what his powers are, and then we need to start training him in how to control them. Beyond that we'll have to cross that bridge when we come to it," Charles answered.

"No, I meant about his relatives," the blue-furred teleporter corrected. At the confused looks he received, he explained, "Look, abuse, proven or not, physical or mental, fact of the matter is that we basically just kidnapped a citizen of England from his legal home. Whether he wanted to stay there or not is beside the point, and I'm no lawyer, but this is just a time bomb waiting to go off. So what are we going to do?"

"We won't have to do anything, actually," Charles assured them all. "That was why I didn't go with all of you in picking Harry up at first, I had a few more phone calls to make. The more important one, was to a Professor Albus Dumbledore." Scarlet Witch gasped, staring at the bald psychic. "Yes, Wanda, _that_ Albus Dumbledore, who just so happens to be the Headmaster of Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. I explained all I knew of the situation at the time, and it was promised that a representative would be sent to check up on Harry. He'll be arriving tomorrow by the way, and I've also made it clear that Harry won't be going anywhere that he doesn't want to go."

"How exactly is it that you know Professor Dumbledore, Professor?" Wanda asked.

Charles just gave her an enigmatic smile and replied, "You mean other than to just discuss your grades, Miss Maximoff?"

"I thought you were taught by Madam Harkness?" Nightcrawler asked the red-haired Avenger.

"Uh... I think I'm going to go and find Harry something to eat," she said nervously before racing out of the room and ignoring the snickering following after her.

After getting to the kitchen and preparing a full meal; sandwich, salad, chips, drink, all that kind of stuff, Wanda walked it up to the observation room Harry Potter was staying in. Along the way she made absolutely certain that she wasn't 'in uniform' any longer and was dressed in common blue jeans and a red blouse. It wouldn't do for a ten-year-old boy to see her in her skintight red bodice and cape uniform from either the Avengers, or the tight red leather one she wore when with the X-Men.

When she opened the door, she had to take a moment or two as she saw him. She may not have been part of the Wizarding world, but nobody across the entire planet amongst the magical communities _hadn't_ heard about Harry Potter and what he'd done. She may be a celebrity in her own right, but meeting somebody that even she admired was still a sobering experience.

"Hi there," she finally said after a minute of trying not to stare at the famous scar. "I'm Wanda Maximoff. I'm... an associate of Dr. MacTaggert. Brought you some food, and I'm sure you're hungry."

"Great! Thanks!" he said earnestly, actually smiling.

She quickly sat the tray before him and then took the chair next to the bed, watching as he devoured the food as fast as possible without choking. Seeing him eat, she had to wonder how often he got a decent meal, until the uncomfortable thought from her subconscious asked it in a different way, asking how often his relatives had bothered to feed him, or if he'd had to steal his scraps.

"Harry, we need to discuss some things," she said after he'd finished half the meal, the sandwich, the chips and most of the salad. "Some hard and uncomfortable things."

"I really don't want to go back to the Dursleys," he said without preamble.

She frowned, noting how he said 'the Dursleys', not 'home', 'relatives' or even his 'Aunt', just 'the Dursleys.' It was a bit sad, that his last living blood relatives were the last people he wanted to see. She might have problems with her own blood family, and while working those problems out usually involved trying to kill each other or various means of mind control, they did work them out and they still considered themselves _family_.

"And nobody is going to make you do anything that you don't want to do, Harry," she assured him.

"But I do have to go somewhere," he pointed out.

"For right now, until you're feeling better, you're staying here. On Muir Island. Anything more permanent can be discussed later. No, what we need to talk about is something much more complicated."

"Like me being a mutant?"

"How did you...?" she was surprised. And that didn't happen often.

"How did I know? I may only be ten years old, but I pay attention, and the Xavier Research Center on Muir Island has made the news once or twice in the past few years. Besides, I honestly can't think of any explanation for what happened other than me being a mutant. That's what we have to talk about, right?"

Surprisingly, he didn't act like being a mutant was bad at all. Quite the opposite really, he seemed to find it somewhat exciting and interesting from his question. She nodded and paid closer attention to his mood.

"For starters," she answered him. "Later on, after you've finished eating, we'll need to run some tests, mostly to make sure you're healthy and everything, but also to determine exactly what your gifts are."

"Gifts?" he asked, his expression the purest confusion she'd ever seen on a child before. "You mean my powers? Never really had any gifts before. That all went to Dudley. My cousin."

Wanda did her best to mask her expression before the anger she felt at Harry's relatives could make itself known and risk making him think she was angry at him. Once she'd mastered her emotions enough, she continued, "Yes, your powers. Do you have any ideas on what they might be yourself?"

"Well, I've been thinking, and when I was... screaming at my... at Vernon, and I was getting really, really angry, I noticed that bolts of electricity were coming out of me. Except it wasn't just that, they looked like those globes where you touch the glass and the electricity jumps to your finger, looking like a lightning bolt? It was more like that, and then there was the aura that came around me. When it went from just an aura to something that looked like electric fire, I remembered this documentary I saw in school once about the natural phenomenon called St. Elmo's Fire and ball lightning. That said it wasn't really electricity, but naturally occurring plasma, the fourth phase of matter. Makes sense really."

Wanda nodded along, showing off a bit of her own education by saying, "Yes, after all plasma is actually just a gas of highly charged ions, where the atoms are missing an electron or two, and those electrons are shooting off all over the place, creating plasma. Lightning itself isn't so much electricity, as the path the electricity took, where the after effect creates plasma in its wake. Thankfully only temporary plasma, as if anything that approached the temperature or properties of say, star plasma, that would be quite a different story, as it would ignite the atmosphere and burn away everything on the surface of the earth."

Harry gulped, staring wide-eyed at the mature lady in front of him, wondering why she was telling him that he might very well have a power that could wipe out everything and everybody on the planet. Then she laughed at the look on his face and explained.

"Not to worry, Harry. That's why you're here. You see, as I'm sure Dr. MacTaggert told you already, this facility is the premier research center dedicated to mutant research. If you want, we can teach you how to control your powers, and make sure that you never hurt anyone if you don't want to."

"That kind of implies that there are people that I might _want_ to hurt," he observed.

She conceded the point, then asked, "True. But aren't there already a few people that you might want to hurt? For what they might have done to you? Or even not done for you?"

Harry immediately shook his head. "No. The Dursleys don't want anything more to do with me than I want with them. We're just stuck with each other. Not sure why. I just know that every time Vernon wanted to throw me to the street or dump me in an orphanage, Aunt Petunia would stop him and give me more chores to do. Maybe they knew I was a mutant?"

"No," Wanda disagreed. "You only manifested your powers today. Before now, nobody could've known you were a mutant."

"So... why? Why did...?"

"Why did they hate you?" she finished for him. He just nodded.

"Harry, there's no easy way to say this, but, like a band-aid, the best is probably to just do it quick. Harry... you're not just a mutant, you are a... a... Harry... you're a wizard," she finally got it out.

He blinked and stared for several moments, until finally, "Sorry, I must still be suffering from blowing up my Aunt's house earlier. I'm a what?"

"A wizard," she repeated. "A person that can use magic. Look, while being a mutant is... well-documented across the world, the magical community is not as... open. Magic users hide in plain sight, keeping their world secret and hidden beneath the outside world. You see Harry, you're not the only one."

"You're a mutant too?" he asked, stunned.

"Well, yes, but I'm also a witch," she answered.

He did a double-take, but seemed to accept it, for the moment.

"Wait a minute, I thought I recognized you! You're the Scarlet Witch! From the Avengers! I've seen you on TV, you're brilliant!" he gushed.

Blushing, Wanda ducked her head a moment. "Well, we all do what we can, some just do it more openly than others. Same as with the magical community. While I take the name Scarlet Witch, it's also well-known that I'm a mutant. Thus, when I use magical abilities, it is blamed on my mutant powers, which aren't as influential towards my magic as most believe."

"Sounds great!" Harry grinned at her.

"You see Harry, being both a mutant and able to use magic is not at all bad, and you aren't the only one. You're actually quite lucky, you see my mutant powers didn't manifest until I was almost sixteen years old, just a couple years from graduating from school."

"School?"

"Yeah, I went to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, learning all about Charms and Potions and Transfiguration and Astronomy and all sorts of wonderful things. Then my powers manifested and I basically had to start my education all over again. Not exactly easy to do when you're only a year away from being considered an adult by your peers and then told you have to go back to school for more training."

"And I won't have to do that?"

"No, I don't believe you will. For one, Hogwarts starts at age 11 and goes to age 17, for seven years. Secondly, learning how to control your gifts isn't really that hard, but it does take training to go from just controlling them to learning how to use them."

"What do you mean?"

Wanda thought it over for several moments, before finally answering, "Well, for starters, controlling your powers would mean basically being able to turn them on and off at will, instead of randomly whenever you're angry or frustrated, right?" He nodded.

"Learning how to use them effectively, however, is a whole other ball of wax. Say, for example you want to cut something open, like with a plasma torch that is used to get past vaults and so forth. Rather than just 'turning on' your powers and blasting out plasma in all directions like you did when you blew up the house, you'd need to focus it down into a tight, controlled beam of energy. And there are lots of other things you can learn how to do. There is no such thing as useless knowledge. Remember that." He nodded again, wide and starry-eyed. Wanda briefly wondered if this was the first time somebody had ever spoken to him like this.

"So what kinds of things can wizards do?" he asked.

Wanda smirked, she had a feeling that question was going to come up sooner or later. "You mean besides just magic?" she asked him. He just shrugged.

"Fair enough. First, let me ask you, have you ever noticed anything strange happen around you? Besides what happened today, I mean. Unexplained things that happened whenever you were angry or upset? Ever find things exploding around you? Things vanishing into thin air? Objects moving without anyone touching them? Things like that."

She'd watched as his face grew steadily pensive, then his eyes looked down in thought for a minute or two, before he slowly nodded his head. She decided to give him a little treat and show off a little.

With a flick of her wrist, she revealed that which nobody on the Avengers, the X-Men, let alone the general public ever saw in her hands. Her wand. 15 inches, oak, dragon heartstrings, good for transfiguration. Smiling at the amazed look in his expression, she cast a basic levitation spell with a silent swish and flick and the chair on the other side of the room lifted off the ground and began to spin around in the air. She placed it back where it went and then silently transfigured the plant by the window first into a cat, then into a tiger, then into a shovel, a bucket, and then finally back into a plant of a different species altogether before changing it back into its original form.

"Wicked!" Harry's smile was almost big enough to split his head wide open. She giggled at his smile.

"That's just the basics, nothing to it after seven years at school," she told him while she vanished her wand back to where she kept it most of the time. "As to why I was saying you were lucky earlier, before you even head off to Hogwarts, we'll teach you how to control your powers, and then during your time off from school, if you want, we can also teach you a few ways on how to use them. If you want."

"Sounds great!" he exclaimed. Until he frowned suddenly, "Only, how am I going to pay for all of this? I mean, the Dursleys certainly aren't going to fund me going to a school just to learn magic. In fact I think they had me set up to go to St. Brutus's School for Delinquents or something like that." Harry couldn't help but notice the darkening in the Scarlet Witch's eyes at his comment, and he was yet again filled with an enormous amount of pity if either of the women he'd just met ever crossed paths with Vernon or Aunt Petunia.

"I wouldn't worry about that just yet, Harry," she comforted him after the dark look was gone.

"Oh no, my letter!" he exclaimed.

"On that, I definitely wouldn't worry," Wanda smiled at him. "If I know Albus Dumbledore at all, he'll have already sent a second one, which should be here by tomorrow."

"But how will they know where to send it to? And who is Albus Dumbledore?"

"Albus Dumbledore is... complicated and not easily explained. He also happens to be the Headmaster at Hogwarts, so like I said, don't worry about it."

"How do you know all this stuff about me anyway?" Harry finally asked.

Wanda took a deep breath. "That's a story for another time. Suffice it to say, young one, that magic has its ways of getting what is needed to where it is needed. As for how we knew you were a mutant, I think it's time I showed you around a bit. Finished with your food?"

Nodding, he handed the tray back and said, "Yeah."

She noticed the way he forlornly stared after the tray after she took it from him, as though wishing that more food would magically appear on it just so he could grab it back. Helping him off the bed, she smiled as she said, "Tell you what, why don't we make our first stop the cafeteria, so I can put these dishes away, and you can see if there's anything you'd like from the menu, all right?"

He smiled at her so warmly and brightly that it nearly broke her heart at the thought of merely offering the boy food would bring forth such a strong reaction. They made it to the cafeteria, and then stayed there for another fifteen minutes while Harry ate to his fill and Wanda grabbed a snack for herself.

After they were done there, Wanda gave Harry the basic tour of the complex, starting with all the public areas, taking him to the gardens, a few of the examination centers, the Muir Island training facility (privately called the "Danger Room Prototype" by the various X-Teams that used it), even the arcade that several of the boys had insisted be installed in one corner. Wanda could barely bring herself to take him away from that after she showed him how all the games were free and how to play them.

Finally, they ended up at the Examination Lab, where most of the group were waiting for them. Included were Moira, Professor X, Sean, Beast, Nightcrawler, and Kitty. "Harry," Wanda introduced everyone, "you've already met Dr. MacTaggert. This is Professor Charles Xavier, one of the founders of this research center. This is Sean Cassidy, Moira's assistant here at the Center. Katherine Pryde, though everyone calls her Kitty for short. And these are Hank McCoy, who everyone calls Beast for obvious reasons, and Kurt Wagner, also called Nightcrawler. Everyone, this is Harry Potter."

Harry couldn't help staring at the last two, especially since they were both covered in blue fur, one looking exactly as his moniker suggested, a giant blue-furred beast. The other looked like a blue devil, plain and simple with his golden eyes, pointy ears, three-fingered hands, two-toed feet and the prehensile tail.

"Greetings, young sir, it is my honor to make your acquaintance," Beast said in a very cultured, if American-accented voice. He then held out a massive clawed hand, and Harry couldn't help grinning as he held out his own hand and shook the hand of the Beast. Wanda wasn't the only X-Men Avenger after all.

Turning to Nightcrawler, Harry was surprised by how gentle the 'devil's' face was, and that alone proved to Harry that this man was the furthest thing from a devil there was. Taking the initiative after shaking hands with Beast, Harry was the one to hold out his hand to Nightcrawler, saying, "Hi, I'm Harry Potter."

Smiling, Nightcrawler accepted the hand and shook it back. "It is a pleasure to meet you, Mister Potter," he replied with a faint German accent.

"Please, call me Harry. Only my teachers call me Mister Potter. And if I had any, I'd make sure my friends just called me Harry."

He didn't miss the dark looks that filtered into everyone's eyes for a moment. Everyone's except Nightcrawler's for some reason. "Harry, then," he acknowledged. "If you need to speak with someone, Harry, about anything at all, I am at your service."

"Know anything about this wizard deal?" he questioned.

At that, Nightcrawler had to laugh and sheepishly scratched the back of his head in embarrassment. "Sadly, no, you'd need to go to Wanda about that, I'm afraid."

"Ah, but I can't really see anything wrong with that, can you?" Harry offered with a smile.

Nightcrawler laughed out loud, "No, my friend, no indeed." Harry's smile brightened significantly when Nightcrawler called him his friend. It was a sad thing that the mutant truly was the first to call Harry such.

"Hello Harry, I'm Professor Charles Xavier," the bald man in a wheelchair moved forward. "I understand you've had a somewhat busy day, and if you'd like, we can let you rest for a while longer. We just wanted to introduce ourselves and let you get acquainted with your surroundings, after what happened."

Harry nodded, understanding what the man was saying, and a bit intimidated by him. Despite being an obvious cripple, there was no doubt in the young mutant wizard's mind that the man before him was capable of a great deal and was very powerful.

"If it's all the same, sir," he spoke respectfully, "I'm actually just as curious as you all probably are. If it means learning how to use my powers, I'm up for any tests you need to run. Besides, after my nap earlier, I'm not exactly tired. Headache finally went away too."

"I'm glad to hear that," Charles smiled at the young boy. "Moira and Beast here will tell you all that you need to do, but mostly it's just a check-up."

"Check-up?" Harry repeated, unfamiliar with the term.

Behind them, Moira MacTaggert snapped the pen she had in her hand in two. Plastic certainly wasn't indestructible, but most knew it took a _lot_ more force to snap it in half than it would a wooden pencil.

"The rest of us will just be here to keep you company, answer any questions you might have about everything going on. Some matters, we'll leave for a later time, but for right now we'll try to make this as quick and painless as possible." Professor X explained to Harry.

Harry just nodded and followed Beast's instructions. By the time Moira had calmed down enough, Beast had finished the basic vitals check and determined that Harry was as fit as he could be, if a bit malnourished. He started suggesting a supplementary diet for Harry to follow to help with that, which mostly consisted of asking Harry what his favorite foods were and if he'd ever tried some of the more foreign dishes that Beast himself preferred.

Once the basic check-up was done, they took some blood samples, a few other DNA samples, and started recording Harry's vital statistics, neurological read-outs, CAT scan, MRI, before putting him in the specialized scanner personally designed by Beast, Forge, Moira, and Charles, which when boiled down to the basics determined exactly what a mutant's power was.

Once the test results came in, several hours of testing later, they all sat back down with Harry in the Lab, and Moira and Beast went about explaining their findings.

"Well aside from the lack of developed muscular and fat deposits due to prolonged undernourishment..." Beast was saying before Harry interrupted him.

"Stop calling me a scrawny little git and get on with it Beast!" he cried laughingly. A few others laughed as Beast just grinned and went on with it.

"Harry is in perfect health for any average ten-year-old. One odd thing I did discover about his hair... it seems to be constantly regenerating itself through means that I cannot contribute to a biological factor."

"Huh?" a few, including Harry, asked.

"He means your hair isn't growing, but staying the same length and in the same weave that it's currently in," Charles explained.

"Oh, well, I coulda told you about the time Aunt Petunia basically shaved me bald before school started one year, because she didn't like how my hair grew wild all the time. By the time I had ridden the bus from her clippers to the front doors of the building, my hair had grown back exactly as it was before," he told them all.

Wanda was nodding her head.

"For some wizards and witches, especially in regards to a family trait, their own magic will support that trait and negate any changes made to it," she said.

"Beyond that, I was also able to confirm the presence and activity of the X-gene," Beast concluded his findings. "Moira?" he turned to his fellow doctor.

"While we're still workin' out the mechanics, we can tell ye the basis of yer powers and what exactly ye can do, Harry." Moira stepped forward to explain.

"Yer suspicions were correct, at least partially so. Yer power is te create and manipulate real plasma. As a result, yer body has also developed an immunity te radiation so complete that we're still analyzing the results! Also, it's not filtered through yer body. Just the opposite in fact. Instead of generating a bio-plasma field, which is somewhat more common for mutants te do, ye are stripping the air around ye of free electrons and excitin' them into creating real plasma from the surrounding matter! There's more to it, but like ah said, we're still analyzing a lot of the data."

"Are there any secondary mutations?" Charles asked. "Aside from the immunity to radiation, which I surmise is his body's adaptation to his primary mutation?"

Moira shook her head. "None that we've been able te identify as of yet. Of course the poor boy just manifested today, Charles. Give him time to rest before he stuns us all over again."

As they all sat and watched Harry absorb this news, they all noticed how he was holding his pointer fingers up in front of his face and was slowly pushing them closer together, then pulling them slowly apart. What really caught everyone's attention was the visible spark of an electric arc going between the two fingers, getting steadily longer and longer the further he pulled his fingers apart until he was approaching Jacob's Ladder sized arcs.

"Wicked," said Harry with a large smile on his face.

TBC...


	3. Diagon Alley

_Muir Island_

After the examinations, despite his protests to the contrary Harry really was quite exhausted and he was sent back to bed after a big supper, which he enjoyed with all the X-Men, getting to meet Colossus and his sister and a few other residents of Muir Island. As much as he wanted to stay up all night getting to know his new friends, Harry was practically dead on his feet when Wanda carried him back to his bed.

He slept until morning and after waking and taking care of morning ablutions he made his way to the cafeteria where he met up with a few familiar faces. Or rather a few of a familiar face.

"Morning Harry," about a dozen of Jamie Madrox, all said together. Each of them had a hearty breakfast in front of them and were eating every bite.

"Good morning. Don't you get a stomach ache when you combine back together?" Harry couldn't help asking the mutant xerox machine.

Eleven of them shrugged while the one that had to be the original grimaced and slowly nodded at Harry. "Did you at least leave enough for me?" he jokingly asked.

"Help yourself," the original Multiple Man offered, no longer eating himself.

"Might want to cut back on the carbs there, Madrox," Kitty spoke as she came from the kitchen with her own tray. "Morning Harry. You're in luck, still some pancakes left after the one-man-army filled up. Or do you Brits call them flapjacks?"

"Both, actually," Harry replied, coming back with his own tray stacked to overfilling with breakfast foods. He was going to take every advantage he could get with these people, until he either found himself back with the Dursleys, they told him enough was enough, or he finally woke up from this amazing dream he was having.

"Slow down tiger!" Kitty warned him as he started to wolf down his food. "It's not going anywhere, and all kidding aside, we've got plenty of food for everyone here at the moment. So, how'd you sleep?"

"Better than I have in years, to be honest," Harry admitted. "Used to have weird dreams, and odd nightmares that always ended with this weird green light. Not a single one last night. I think I was just too knackered to bother dreaming at all. So, are we the only ones up so far?"

"Nah, I saw the Doc and Beast still hard at it in the lab as I was making my way over here," she answered. "I also heard you've got a big day yourself planned. Wanda and the Prof were talking about that head master guy's rep coming to pick you up for some sort of shopping trip. Normally, I'd be all over that, until I heard it would be for your school supplies. Shopping for school is like saying hacking for work!"

"Huh? You lost me there," Harry was confused.

"You're not the only one," one of the Jamie's commented. After that, every single one of his copies was sucked back into the original, only for him to hit himself on the head and have three more pop out and start carrying away the dishes. "Sorry about that," the original nervously apologized, wilting under Kitty's glare.

"Never mind," Kitty waved off the question. "Anyway, the guy from your magic school is going to be stopping by a little before noon, and way the talk was going, he and Wanda would then escort you to some wizard shopping mall called diagonally or something like that, and then after that you'd come back here until the school term starts. Course, you were still asleep when they were talking all this over, so they'll probably be coming down to tell you themselves pretty soon here."

"Why bother, when you've saved us the trouble?" Wanda spoke up as she 'escorted' Professor X into the cafeteria, walking them over to where Kitty and Harry sat eating breakfast.

"Who's coming?" Harry asked around a mouthful of sausage.

"A representative of the Headmaster at Hogwarts," Charles answered as Wanda brought back two trays, one for herself and one for the Professor. "Albus would've liked to have come himself, but his letter said something about a... victory party that he just couldn't miss out on. Of course, I had independent sources confirm that Professor Dumbledore is actually aiding the International Confederacy of Warlocks with a rather... urgent matter, shall we say."

"What did Stephen have to say about that demon uprising, by the way?" Wanda asked. As the Scarlet Witch, she was well known in the Magical Community, but unfortunately her penchant for chaos magic and her less than mastery over some of her powers kept her out of the more socialized groups therein. One being the group of wizards and magic users that did three things with its membership; print out titles, organize keggers and wild parties for all its members, and bring together the most powerful, talented, and intelligent magic users of each generation to maintain order throughout the world.

"Only that it had finally been taken care of by three junior members, and the victory-party was 'on them', whatever that means," Charles responded with a flat tone.

"I don't get it," Harry was confused.

Wanda was about to open her mouth to explain it to him, only she had _just_ taken a bite of her breakfast steak and it was a tough piece she had to chew for a bit. Which gave her the time to actually consider what she _would_ say to explain it to Harry. Finally, after she swallowed, she answered, "You'll understand when you're older. As to the answer to your question, just ask about the ICW when you're at school, and you'll figure it out."

"Wait a minute! The Headmaster of my school, the man responsible for my education in magic and what you're telling me is my heritage, would rather go to some party rather than meet me and take me shopping for school supplies?" Harry suddenly asked, incredulous.

"No, not quite," Charles answered uncomfortably.

"Well?" Harry demanded to know.

Charles was definitely squirming in his wheelchair now, Wanda could see. She wondered at the entertainment value of watching the most powerful psychic on the planet flinching under the gaze of an untrained, unschooled ten-year-old mutant wizard for a few minutes. She decided to wait another minute before coming to his rescue. _'Traitor!'_ came the silent accusation in her mind. She could barely hold in her giggles.

"Albus Dumbledore isn't one to really act his age, and would much rather celebrate the victory, than dwell on the losses, if there were any," Charles explained, loosening his collar a bit now. "Albus is actually probably still at the party and hasn't even heard of what happened just yet. Not through any fault of his own, he's just had other things on his mind, I'm sure."

"And this man is the Headmaster of a school?" Harry exclaimed.

"Just wait until you meet him," Wanda couldn't hold back her laughter any more. "And word of warning, Harry, don't take anything that Albus Dumbledore says or does at face value. He's a crazy old coot, but a wily one at that! Don't think that he doesn't care, because it's quite the opposite."

"What do you mean?"

"Dumbledore is as stern and demanding and commanding as you can imagine anyone to be, when the time calls for it," Charles tried to explain. "But he's really very much still a teenager himself at heart. And while he does care a great deal, he does not let himself fall into depression over any losses or sacrifices made during situations where everything that could have been done, was done. He's brilliant, yet he doesn't obsess over his strategies and tactics, simply reacting to the situation as called for, and making plans well in advance."

"How do you mean?"

"Well, for example, the party he's probably still at right now, wouldn't be going on, if it wasn't for three junior members of the Confederacy managing to contain and defeat a demon threat in eastern Siberia." The Scarlet Witch paused to take a sip of her milk before continuing. "While I don't know the details over how it was done, more than likely those three only succeeded to either their training, spells they were taught, or some artifact they were given, or something else similar. As junior members, they are taught and trained by the senior members, of which Albus Dumbledore is one. So more likely than not, he'd taught each of them some spell, or gave them some trinket, or just trained them so that when it came down to crunch hour, they had exactly what the needed, when they needed it."

"Really?"

"Really," Wanda nodded. "Of course, at the time of learning those spells, getting those artifacts, receiving that training, it probably made absolutely no sense to them at all, and would seem like a waste of time. But like I said, part of Dumbledore's brilliance is that he plans ahead. Furthermore, the ICW doesn't just send the young ones off to die alone. Dumbledore was probably at the same battle as the three that were given credit for winning it, as were other senior members. What was it you said earlier, Professor? That those three were paying for the party?" Charles just chuckled and nodded his head.

"Sweet!"

For the next hour or so, other X-Men, or residents of Muir Island popped in for some breakfast, while Harry practically interrogated Professor X and Wanda over his new school and Headmaster. Finally, Charles announced that their "visitor" had arrived, meaning that Dumbledore's representative to meet with Harry. Charles lead the way to the main atrium and then introduced Harry to the largest man that he had ever seen in his whole life. He made Unc... Vernon look like Dudley in comparison!

"Ah, Mister Hagrid, is it?" Charles paused to address the giant of a man.

"Aye, but you'd best be calling me Hagrid, none o' that mister hogwash," the large, bearded and hairy behemoth spoke in a heavy accent, "Professor Dumbledore heard 'bout what happened. 'E got yer letter, too, 'At is if yer... uh, lemme see here..." The man rummaged around in his massive moleskin coat with it's many pockets for a minute or two until he pulled out a piece of parchment with a single name written on it. "Ah! Here we are! Professor Charles Xavier, is it?"

"Indeed I am, sir. And this," Charles introduced as Harry stepped forward, "is Harry Potter."

"Well, that he is, that he is," Hagrid commented with a warm smile as he looked down on the young boy. "Las' time I saw you, you was only a baby. Yeh look a lot like yet dad, but yeh've got yet mom's eyes."

Harry could only stare, wide-eyed up into the man's open and bearded face, until finally he said out loud, "I'm sorry, who are you?"

"True, I haven't introduced meself proper like," Hagrid scratched the back of his head in mild embarrassment. "Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts. Also, personal envoy of Professor Albus Dumbledore. Great man, Dumbledore is. Greatest Headmaster Hogwarts ever had."

"Oh," Harry replied. "All right then. Where is it we're going?" he asked Professor Xavier.

Charles chuckled a bit, and quickly explained about Diagon Alley, and how it was the central commerce center for all of Magical London. It was also where they would be picking up his school supplies and everything.

"Professor Xavier, sir," Harry stopped them before they could move on. "While I really appreciate everything that you've done for me so far, and everything else you're offering. How exactly am I supposed to pay for all of this? Between staying here at this facility that I have no doubt costs quite a few quid just to leave the lights on, and now seven years of school, which also costs money... how am I supposed to pay for it all?"

"Bah! Don't worry about that," said Hagrid in place of the Professor speaking. "D'yeh think yer parents didn't leave yeh anything? Nah, first stop fer us is Gringotts. Wizards' bank."

"Wizards have banks?" Harry asked, to the laughter of nearly everyone in the room.

"Just the one. Gringotts. Run by goblins," answered Hagrid.

"Goblins?"

"Don't worry Harry," Wanda comforted him, "I've met them, and while they're not exactly the prettiest magical creatures around, they're strict, but fair and they respect those that respect them... and that have a lot of money. Trust us on this, you're well taken care of."

"Yeah," agreed Hagrid, "so yeh'd be mad ter try an' rob it, I'll tell yeh that. Never mess with goblins, Harry. Gringotts is the safest place in the world fer anything yeh want ter keep safe - 'cept maybe Hogwarts."

"We can discuss all that later," Wanda interrupted any further discussion. "For now, we'd best be on our way. Gentlemen, if you'd be so kind as to follow me, I'll lead the way to our airfield. Faster than taking the ferry back to the mainland, and no stopovers, direct to downtown London."

"Hmph, muggles and their machines," Hagrid grunted, looking a bit nervous at everything around him.

"Muggles?" Harry repeated, confused.

_'Suffice to say, Harry,'_ Charles explained telepathically, _'it is a slang term for those that are unable to perform wizard magic. It is also why I will not be accompanying you on this leg of your journey. If you do have any questions, just think about me real hard, I'll hear you.'_

"Professor?" Harry looked all around him, but found that the paralyzed mutant had remained in the arboretum and was not actually in their company. Wanda noticed Harry's confusion, and explained.

"The Professor is a telepath, Harry," she told him. "That means that he can hear and sense the thoughts of all those around him, as well as project his own thoughts back to them. Charles Xavier is actually the world's most powerful psychic, able to hear and speak to the minds of every living being on the planet."

"Wow," Harry was stunned.

In short order they boarded one of the few X-Jets they had on hand at Muir Island, Hagrid was clearly uncomfortable in flying in such a manner, while Harry peppered both his elders with questions. During the flight, Hagrid also handed him a copy of his Hogwarts Letter, and he read it eagerly. Before he was even aware of it, they were disembarking onto a roof, and then took an elevator down to the ground floor and started walking the streets of London.

"So, tell me Hagrid," Wanda asked of the friendly half-giant, "is the Leaky Cauldron still in the same place?"

"Aye," he was smiling again, now that they were back on a more familiar subject with him. "Most famous pub in all England, 'course it's still the same and still in the same place."

"Good, then we only have to ride for one stop on the train."

"Oh, er... right, I s'pose we do," Hagrid looked around, only just now recognizing that they weren't on the right street for their eventual destination.

A quick subway ride later, and they were standing in front of the "Leaky Cauldron".

It was a tiny, grubby-looking pub. If Hagrid and Wanda hadn't pointed it out, Harry wouldn't have even noticed it was there. The people hurrying by didn't glance at it. Their eyes slid from the big book shop on one side to the record shop on the other as if they couldn't see the Leaky Cauldron at all. In fact, Harry had the most peculiar feeling that only he and his guides could see it. Before he could mention this, Hagrid had steered them inside.

For a famous place, it was very dark and shabby. A few old women were sitting in a corner, drinking tiny glasses of sherry. One of them was smoking a long pipe. A little man in a top hat was talking to the old bartender, who was quite bald and looked like a toothless walnut. The low buzz of chatter stopped when they walked in. Everyone seemed to know Hagrid; they waved and smiled at him, and the bartender reached for a glass, saying, "The usual, Hagrid?"

"Can't, Tom, I'm on Hogwarts business," Hagrid proudly stated, putting a heavy hand on Harry's back.

Wanda, off to the side, winced, and slowly counted down from three. Just as she pulled in her last finger, the old bartender exclaimed, "Good Lord! Is this... can this be—Bless my soul! Harry Potter! What an honor!" Before anybody could stop him, he'd raced over and was shaking Harry's hand, saying over and over, "Welcome back, Mister Potter, welcome back!"

Harry didn't know what to say. Everybody was looking at him, and very soon after, he was the center of attention for more than just the old barkeep. Wanda did her best to pull them along, but it was still nearly a quarter of an hour before they finally made it through the pub and into the back alley.

"What was _that_ all about?" he exclaimed once they were free and clear.

"Uh, we'll talk about that later," Wanda uncomfortably moved them along. "Now, Hagrid, if you would do the honors?"

"Huh? Oh, right, right," the half-giant nodded his head and then pulled out a pink(?) umbrella. After counting the bricks above the lone trashcan in the alley, Hagrid tapped a specific one, and the brick he had touched quivered and wriggled, then in the middle, a small hole appeared, it grew wider and wider, and a second later they were facing an archway large enough even for Hagrid, an archway onto a cobbled street that twisted and turned out of sight.

"Welcome," said Hagrid, "to Diagon Alley."

He grinned at Harry's amazement. They stepped through the archway. Harry looked quickly over his shoulder and saw the archway shrink instantly back into solid wall. Turning back to face the Alley proper, Harry came face-to-face with a whole new world.

_Gringotts_

They had reached a snowy white building that towered over the other little shops. Standing beside its burnished bronze doors, wearing a uniform of scarlet and gold, was -

"Yeah, that's a goblin," said Hagrid quietly as they walked up the white stone steps toward him. The goblin was about a head shorter than Harry. He had a swarthy, clever face, a pointed beard and, Harry noticed, very long fingers and feet. He bowed as they walked inside. Now they were facing a second pair of doors, silver this time, with words engraved upon them:

_Enter, stranger, but take heed_

_Of what awaits the sin of greed,_

_For those who take, but do not earn,_

_Must pay most dearly in their turn._

_So if you seek beneath our floors_

_A treasure that was never yours,_

_Thief, you have been warned, beware_

_Of finding more than treasure there._

"Sound advice, Harry," Wanda cautioned him. "And true of many things in this world, and others."

Harry gulped, and decided to keep his hands in his pockets until told to do otherwise.

Shortly, they'd spoken with one of the tellers, and then taken by a goblin named Griphook to a mine-cart that turned into the wildest roller coaster ride Harry'd ever been on. He almost asked the goblin if they could go faster, but the only thing stopping him was the expressions on the adults' faces. They both looked rather ill and green around the gills. In short order, they came to his vault and Harry got the next surprise of his life. He owned Scrooge McDuck's Money-Bin, only it was underground, and beneath London instead of in Duckburg.

"All this is... mine?" he was stunned.

"Yes, Harry," replied Wanda, giving him a torn expression behind his back. "Best not to try and empty it, just grab a bag for today. This is yours, and you can come back any time, if you need more."

Harry nodded in agreement and while he probably took more than he needed for this one trip, he wanted to splurge just a little bit on himself. After the day he'd had yesterday, he felt, if anyone, he definitely deserved to be splurged on a bit.

After that, it was another crazy roller coaster ride back to the surface, and then it was time to go shopping. First stop, Wanda insisted, was getting him new clothes, both school robes, and more casual wear. That took about an hour for both the fitting, the dressing, and then the shopping around. That she promised to get him some more normal, what Hagrid called "muggle" clothing made it almost bearable. For the first time in his life, Harry had clothes of his own.

Once he was dressed, then they started in on his school list. First stop, Flourish and Blotts, the book store full of spell books for every type of magic a wizard could ever possibly need. Unless you're a dark wizard, no Dark Arts beyond the slightly dark gray.

Hagrid tried to stop them at getting nothing but the list of books, but Wanda kept perusing the shelves and seemingly at random, pulled one after another and handed them all to the half-giant, who was following along carrying all their purchases.

"First things first, Harry," the Scarlet Witch informed her pupil, "We'll go ahead and buy all the grade levels for the _Basic Book of Spells_, that way during the summer time, I or someone else can help you in getting ahead. We also need to get you a lot of primer books. Information is key to a great deal many things, Harry. Remember that. If you want to succeed and do well in this world, hone your wits, and you'll go far."

"You musta bin in Ravenclaw," Hagrid muttered from beneath the pile of books he was already carrying.

"For your information, Hagrid," she smiled back at the large man, "I was in Gryffindor. But I guarantee you that every single day since, I have often wished I was _half_ as prepared as Harry will be. He's even worse off than I was, as I was at least familiar with the Wizarding world before I received my letter! He's been raised by the worst sort of muggles around for the past ten years!"

"What's Ravenclaw and Gryffindor?" Harry questioned, just the latest in a long list of questions he'd been asking since this sojourn had began.

"Oh, they're Houses, sort of like dormitories, at Hogwarts," Wanda answered, distracted as she pulled off another three books and handed them to Hagrid. "There are a total of four Houses. Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin. Students are separated at the first of every year into their Houses based on their personal qualities. Don't worry, you don't have to _do_ anything."

"What are the qualities?" he asked.

"You'll see," she smiled teasingly at him, while grabbing another four books off of three different shelves and adding them to the pile. "Well, that'll have to do for now. Once you're finished with these, I suppose we can come back and fill out the rest of your education."

Harry's eyes nearly bugged completely out of his head at the sight of Hagrid's entire upper body no longer being visible behind the stacks of books he was carrying. "Uh... how are we going to carry all this stuff?" he finally asked, nervously.

"Oh, don't worry about that Harry, we'll get you a school trunk for later on, but as for these books," she began to explain as they approached the counter at the front of the store. "Excuse me? Can I have these delivered by this afternoon to a specific address?"

Half an hour later, they'd gotten most everything else left on Harry's list, including all the potion ingredients from the apothecary, a pewter cauldron, a set of scales, a complete writing set and sheets of parchment, and a few other things, including a collapsible telescope and a nice little hand-held globe that would show him every constellation in the universe, allowing him to practically breeze through his Astronomy lessons for the first few years. On Wanda's suggestion, he bought a couple of them and another trinket called a Rememberall, saying they'd make excellent gifts for Beast and Moira back on Muir Island.

"OK," Harry read off the list, "that's everything, and just leaves... a wand."

"Oh, well for that, there's only Ollivander's," Hagrid commented, carrying all their purchases so far. "Finest wand-makers around, they are."

"Yes, I remember," Wanda agreed, and lead the way.

A tinkling bell rang somewhere in the depths of the shop as they stepped inside. It was a tiny place, empty except for a single, spindly chair that Hagrid sat on to wait, while Wanda hovered protectively around the younger boy. Harry felt strangely as though he had entered a very strict library; he swallowed a lot of new questions that had just occurred to him and looked instead at the thousands of narrow boxes piled neatly right up to the ceiling. For some reason, the back of his neck prickled. The very dust and silence in here seemed to tingle with some secret magic.

"Good afternoon," said a soft voice. Harry jumped. Hagrid must have jumped, too, because there was a loud crunching noise and he got quickly off the spindly chair. Wanda had spun about instantly and for a second, he thought he'd seen a spark of red energy in her hands, but it faded too quickly for him to be sure.

An old man was standing before them, his wide, pale eyes shining like moons through the gloom of the shop.

"Hello," said Harry awkwardly.

"Ah yes," said the man. "Yes, yes. I thought I'd be seeing you soon. Harry Potter." It wasn't a question. "You have your mother's eyes. It seems only yesterday she was in here herself, buying her first wand. Ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, made of willow. Nice wand for charm work."

"Your father, on the other hand, favored a mahogany wand. Eleven inches. Pliable. A little more power and excellent for transfiguration. Well, I say your father favored it, but it's really the wand that chooses the wizard, of course." The old man approached, but Wanda stepped between them, giving the old man a grin as he came up short, seemingly as though it had been his intention all along.

"And that's where..." He was looking directly at Harry's scar.

"I'm sorry to say I sold the wand that did it," he said softly. "Thirteen-and-a-half inches. Yew. Powerful wand, very powerful, and in the wrong hands... well, if I'd known what that wand was going out into the world to do..."

He shook his head and then, to Harry's relief, spotted both Wanda and Hagrid.

"My, oh my. If it isn't the Scarlet Witch herself, Miss Wanda Maximoff. A pleasure as always, madam," he bowed graciously. "Oak, fifteen inches, somewhat pliable, good for Transfiguration."

"Yes sir," she blushed briefly. "It is a pleasure to see you again, too, sir."

"And Rubeus! Rubeus Hagrid! How nice to see you again... Oak, sixteen inches, rather bendy, wasn't it?" Mr. Ollivander turned his attention to the sitting half-giant now.

"It was, sir, yes," said Hagrid.

"Good wand, that one. But I suppose they snapped it in half when you got expelled?" said Mr. Ollivander, suddenly stern.

"Er—yes, they did, yes," said Hagrid, shuffling his feet. "I've still got the pieces, though," he added brightly.

"But you don't use them?" said Mr. Ollivander sharply.

"Oh, no, sir," said Hagrid quickly. Harry noticed he gripped his pink umbrella very tightly as he spoke.

"Hmmm," said Mr. Ollivander, giving Hagrid a piercing look. "Well, now. Mr. Potter. Let me see." He pulled a long tape measure with silver markings out of his pocket. "Which is your wand arm?"

"Er—well, I'm right-handed," said Harry.

"Hold out your arm. That's it." He measured Harry from shoulder to finger, then wrist to elbow, shoulder to floor, knee to armpit and round his head. As he measured, he said, "Every Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance, Mr. Potter. We use unicorn hairs, phoenix tail feathers, and the heartstrings of dragons. No two Ollivander wands are the same, just as no two unicorns, dragons, or phoenixes are quite the same. And of course, you will never get such good results with another wizard's wand."

Harry suddenly realized that the tape measure, which was measuring between his nostrils, was doing this on its own. Mr. Ollivander was flitting around the shelves, taking down boxes.

"That will do," he said, and the tape measure crumpled into a heap on the floor. "Right then, Mr. Potter. Try this one. Beechwood and dragon heartstring. Nine inches. Nice and flexible. Just take it and give it a good wave."

Harry took the wand and (feeling foolish) waved it around a bit, but Mr. Ollivander snatched it out of his hand almost at once.

"Maple and phoenix feather. Seven inches. Quite whippy. Try—"

Harry tried, but he had hardly raised the wand when it, too, was snatched back by Mr. Ollivander.

"No, no... here, ebony and unicorn hair, eight and a half inches, springy. Go on, go on, try it out."

Harry tried. And tried. He had no idea what Mr. Ollivander was waiting for. The pile of tried wands was mounting higher and higher on the spindly chair, but the more wands Mr. Ollivander pulled from the shelves, the happier he seemed to become.

"Tricky customer, eh? Not to worry, we'll find the perfect match here somewhere... I wonder, now... yes, why not, unusual combination; holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple."

Harry took the wand. He felt a sudden warmth in his fingers. He raised the wand above his head, brought it swishing down through the dusty air and a stream of red and gold sparks shot from the end like a firework, throwing dancing spots of light on to the walls. Hagrid whooped and clapped and Mr. Ollivander cried, "Oh, bravo! Yes, indeed, oh, very good. Well, well, well... how curious... how very curious..."

He put Harry's wand back into its box and wrapped it up in brown paper, still muttering, "Curious... curious..."

"Sorry," said Harry, "but what's curious?"

Mr. Ollivander fixed Harry with his pale stare.

"I remember every wand I've ever sold, Mr. Potter. Every single wand. It just so happens that the phoenix whose tail feather is in your wand, gave another feather—just one other. It is very curious indeed that you should be destined for this wand when its brother... why, its brother gave you that scar."

Harry swallowed. Wanda gasped. Hagrid gaped.

"Yes, thirteen-and-a-half inches. Yew. Curious indeed how these things happen. The wand chooses the wizard, remember... I think we must expect great things from you, Mr. Potter... After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things—terrible, yes, but great."

Harry shivered. He wasn't sure he liked Mr. Ollivander too much. He paid seven gold Galleons for his wand, and Mr. Ollivander bowed them from his shop. "That was... creepy," he finally said upon leaving.

"Wasn' expectin' that," Hagrid commented.

"I don't think anyone was," Wanda agreed.

"Oh, right!" Hagrid suddenly stopped. "A'fore I forget... Harry, I know yer birthday is comin' up here soon. Unfortunately, Dumbledore's got me on Hogwarts business that day. Wasn't expectin' it to happen all at once like this, but it's jus' the way things turned out. Anyway, if you wouldn't mind, I was hopin' ye'd let me buy yer birthday gift, just a bit early here."

"Oh, you don't have to—" Harry tried to protest.

"Nonsense," Hagrid waved it off. "I know. I'll buy ya yer pet. Firs' Years are allowed to have one pet wit'em. I'll get ye an owl. Owls are ruddy useful, they are. Deliver yer mail an everythin', right smart too."

"Thank you, Hagrid," Wanda interrupted before Harry could protest any further, "That's most generous of you. We'll be sure to send you an invitation with the time and day of the party. And I think it would be most appropriate to use your own gift to Harry to deliver it. C'mon, lets go."

And so Harry found himself the proud owner of a beautiful snowy white owl, fresh in from the Netherlands, the owner at Eeylops Owl Emporium told them. Had just arrived the day before. Back at Muir Island, Harry named his owl Hedwig, after shooting through several names with the rather intelligent creature, reading from one of his school books; _A History of Magic_. Although, for some reason, when Wolverine visited the island briefly, he first called her _Narya_.

It also, just so happened that the afternoon - early evening after they got back from their trip, that Harry finally got to meet Professor Dumbledore for the first time.

"XAVIER!" the shout actually echoed into every corner of the Research Center.

"Normally he just uses that horrid version of magical telepathy on me," Charles dryly commented as he lead the way for everyone to the Arboretum, where Professor Dumbledore stood waiting, a look of high annoyance clear in his expression.

Harry's first impression of his future Headmaster was that the man was a walking cliché. He was tall, thin, and very old, judging by the silver of his hair and beard, which were both long enough to tuck into his belt. He was wearing long robes, a purple cloak that swept the ground, and high-heeled, buckled boots. His blue eyes were light, bright, and sparkling behind half-moon spectacles and his nose was very long and crooked, as though it had been broken at least twice. In short, he looked like the very image of a wizard that almost anyone would first picture when you mention it.

"What was the meaning of this, Charles?" Albus Dumbledore spoke at a much softer volume, but his voice was still tight with emotion. "You send me one letter, ONE! Then you contact Minerva when I don't answer immediately? Merlin, I was only at a victory party! I do have means of contacting me in an emergency! Any reason why I only heard about what happened _today_, from Hagrid after he came back this afternoon?"

"Well, Professor McGonagall made it seem as though it would be best not to disturb you," Charles calmly replied to the question.

Professor Dumbledore glared down at Professor X for a long moment, before retorting, "This is for the business with Magnus, isn't it? It's not my fault you're on the outs with the man!"

"You didn't have to just stand there, laughing your ass off as we made complete fools of ourselves," Charles mumbled, embarrassed.

"Like I was going to stand between you two?" Dumbledore laughed all over again.

"Excuse me, gentlemen," Wanda chose that moment to step forward. "The reason you're here, Professor Dumbledore, I take it, has to do with our current guest? Harry? This is Professor Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts. Professor Dumbledore, Harry Potter."

Harry stepped up beside the Scarlet Witch and stared up at the twinkling eyes of Professor Dumbledore, not quite sure what to do or say. Thankfully, Dumbledore made the first move.

"Hello Harry," the old wizard greeted him with a twinkling smile. "I came, literally," a brief glare at Professor X, "as soon as I heard what happened. And first things first. I owe you my most sincerest apologies, my dear boy."

"Uh, I'm sorry, Professor, but what have you got to apologize to me for?" Harry was confused.

Dumbledore gave a weary sigh, before sitting himself on one of the available benches. "I was the one that placed you on the Dursley's doorstep almost ten years ago," he answered.

"You _WHAT?_" came a shout from several sources, including both Moira MacTaggert and Wanda Maximoff. The wizened old wizard winced for a moment, but largely kept his focus on Harry.

"I could give you all manner of excuses Harry, but the truth of the matter is... I am the one responsible for you being in the situation with the Dursleys, and I am likewise responsible for their negligent abuse towards you. I cannot even begin to ask for your forgiveness."

Harry frowned, something about the Headmaster's admission of guilt not making sense to him.

"Excuse me, Professor," he spoke before either of the furious redheaded women could really sink their claws into the wizard, "but how are you responsible for any of this? I seriously doubt you actually ordered the Dursleys to leave me locked in the cupboard under the stairs."

Dumbledore's eyes went wide in shock, his mouth dropping open a bit for only a moment before he managed to collect himself once more. "_Of course_ not! But, still... I gave you to them when you were still a baby... And I regret to say, that I had been warned before doing so that the Dursleys were possibly not the best choice in guardians for a growing wizard."

"But you didn't tell them or ask them to treat me the way they did, did you?" Harry slowly asked him.

Dumbledore shook his head, still too overwhelmed by his guilt to see where then ten-year-old was going with this. "So, in what way are you responsible for actions they took of their own choice?" Harry asked.

"I could've done something. I _should've_ done something!" Dumbledore protested. "All evil needs to prevail is that a good man do nothing."

"Did you know?" Wanda demanded.

Wearily, Dumbledore sunk in on himself, and shook his head. "That's what makes it all the worse. I did not know, because I never checked. Where I should've been watching over him, at least looking in on him once in a while... I'm so sorry, Harry."

"Sir, if I may ask," Harry sat down next to the clearly guilt stricken wizard, and he had a feeling that if it _was_ an act, then Professor X would be able to sense that, "why _did_ you send me to the Dursleys when I was a baby?"

Taking a deep breath and letting out a long sigh, he tried his best to answer Harry's question as honestly as he could, without revealing too much, too soon.

"It was less than a day since the word had spread and the event itself happened. All trace of Voldemort was gone, the house was destroyed, and your parents dead. Then I heard the news, the wards I had helped to place over your parent's home had fallen. I acted as quickly as I could, sending Hagrid to your home the moment I confirmed it. Thankfully, he was the first on scene. He found you alive."

"Those were dark times, Harry, dark times. And while that's no excuse, it is the only explanation for my decisions that fateful day, ten years ago. There was so much death, each day bringing word of another tragedy, another killing, another atrocity. There was no hope left. But you... Voldemort tried to kill you, and not only did you survive, but he was vanquished instead. You had to be protected, at all costs, as surviving Voldemort, only to be killed by one of his minions a day later would make the whole thing meaningless."

"So, as soon as Hagrid informed me that you were alive, I instructed him to bring you to me as soon as possible, and from what I suspected happened that night... I knew of only one place safe enough."

"The Dursleys?" Harry guessed.

Dumbledore nodded. "Your mother's sister. Your grandparents, on both sides, had been dead for years, unfortunately. There were no other siblings, no other blood relatives, only Petunia Dursley."

"Why was that important?" Moira insisted.

"Blood..." Wanda suddenly gasped. "You erected Blood Wards, to protect them and all that reside in their home! But that would only work if..."

"If there was a sacrifice involved," Dumbledore finished for the Scarlet Witch. "Lily Potter, your mother Harry, gave her life to protect you, to save you. With all the love in her heart, she spilled her blood to ensure the safety of her child. Safety... that I sacrificed your happiness for."

"I gave everybody else the excuse that it would be best for you to be raised away from the Wizarding World, away from a life of fame and hero-worship, and be allowed to grow up just a normal boy. Alas, even there, I failed."

"Sir, if you will," Harry put forth, "what would've happened, hypothetically, if you had put me with a loving wizard family? One where I would've grown up with the perfect childhood and never known a day of suffering in my life? You said it yourself, if my mother giving her life to save mine, only for me to be killed a day later by dark wizards attacking whatever foster family you place me with, it would've made everything meaningless. So... while I'll never like the Dursleys... I do understand why you had to put me with them, sir. And... for what it's worth, I do forgive you. After all, if I hadn't been with the Dursleys, there's a good chance that I wouldn't be here today."

Dumbledore's eyes were twinkling again, but this time, everybody could tell it was with unshed tears.

"Thank you, Harry. I don't deserve it, but thank you."

"Am I going to have to go back to them?" Harry asked, suddenly concerned.

"OVER MY DEAD BODY!" Moira shouted.

Dumbledore, on the other hand, was looking unusually fierce all of a sudden. "I will have to do some additional research on that, Harry. But not to worry, I will give it my full attention, and likewise give your situation the attention it deserves. For the time being though," he gave the young boy a grinning wink, "I think it will be safe to call your stay here on Muir Island as a sort of... late summer vacation. And I certainly don't see the harm in leaving you here until the start of term. And seeing that you have at least one alumni of Hogwarts here to help you, I am quite confident in her abilities to guide you properly until you arrive at Hogwarts itself."

"In the mean time," he stood up, "I am afraid there are several... personal matters I must attend to. So, Charles, Dr. MacTaggert, Miss Maximoff, thank you for hosting me and bearing with my presence as long as you have here. Mr. Potter, I look forward to seeing you at the start-of-term. Good day, everyone."

And then with a loud crack, the wizard spun on a point and disappeared.

"OK, now I am jealous!" Nightcrawler whined at the smell-less teleportation the old wizard had used.

Everybody laughed.

TBC...


	4. Muir Island

_Muir Island_

_One Week Later_

It had been a very busy week for Harry. At first they were obviously just easing him into things, living at the Research Center, adapting to the idea of being both a wizard and a mutant, and the daily check-ups as they were called, to make sure he was healthy. He was still, as Beast kept pointing out, a scrawny little git, but he wasn't in any danger of keeling over from starvation any time soon, especially not with the three square meals a day they were all feeding him.

The day after they got back from Diagon Alley, Wanda sat down with him and began to explain, in more detail, about the Wizarding world, and magic in general. He was allowed to ask questions, and he did quite often. To his everlasting surprise, Wanda never got upset over his questions, and she treated each as a serious and valid inquiry, never dismissing his question as being stupid, or not worth answering as a lot of his teachers from primary school treated him.

That afternoon, the books from Flourish and Blotts arrived, and Harry discovered the other side of the coin, as Wanda soon had him reading cover to cover all of the books that she called the "bare minimum basics, at the least" and wouldn't let him quit until he could give her a satisfactory summary of each book. She didn't expect and did not ask him for quotes or anything like that, and while he wasn't thick in the head, reading was not exactly something he could say he really enjoyed all that much.

Still, so long as he demonstrated that he _understood_ what the book was trying to teach him, she let him stop for a while. During the breaks between books, she demonstrated more magic, most often the very thing he'd just been reading about so he would associate with it better. Harry Potter was more of a practical person than a theory-based wizard, she was discovering.

The day after that, Beast and Moira announced that Harry was fit enough to be tested on his control and the limits of what his powers were capable of. Which meant that after breakfast and his check-up, he spent an hour with Wanda on another book of magic, and then another hour trying out the practical for himself with his new wand. Then, lunch, which usually lasted about fifteen minutes, even with all the teasing and food-fights between the child and the childish. And after lunch, Professor X, Beast, and Moira approached Harry and asked if he wanted to test out his powers in the Danger Room prototype they had on site.

Harry quickly agreed, and soon found himself trussed up in a dark blue, skin-tight uniform with yellow boots, belt, and a pair of specially made goggles that Beast assured him was matched to his prescription. He entered the Danger Room alone at first and was told to walk to the center of the room, from where he could see the control room and they could see him as well.

"Now, Harry," Charles' voice came over the loudspeaker, "Our first test is simply to get a better reading on what your power can do. So for right now, I'd like for you to see if you can just figure out how to activate your powers at will. We'll try additional tests later on, but for now we'll start simple, all right?"

"All right," Harry nodded, and tried to concentrate.

It was actually simpler than he'd expected, half worried that he needed to build up to another towering rage, like he was against his... against Vernon when his powers had manifested. Instead, all he had to do was think about it and then it was just like moving his arm or clenching his fist. At first, it started slowly, the slow build-up of plasma around him, until the sparks started, which quickly evolved into electric arcs, and then the misty aura showed up, which soon reappeared as the same electric-fire aura that surrounded him completely.

"Incredible!" Beast remarked from the control room.

"Radiation spike," Moira commented from her own station. "But localized, and not spreadin' at all. Ah think tis just a reaction te the free-floatin' electrons Harry's plasma is sparkin'. Seems te be all across the board. Electromagnetic, Thermal, Visual, Ultraviolet, Particle, Beta, even a touch of Gamma radiation in there. Tis like he's stripping apart every atom of everythin' around him an usin' it te create a broad-spectrum plasma."

"Most unusual," Beast agreed.

"How do you feel, Harry?" Charles asked.

Harry shrugged, and answered, "Fine Professor. At first I thought I'd have to do something, but really, at this stage, it's like using another part of my body. I don't really have to _do_ anything, I just do it."

"Radiation spike is climbin' the rads," said Moira urgently, "but stayin' localized. Amazin!"

"Harry, see if you can turn off your power now," Charles suggested.

Harry shrugged, and then willed the effects to stop, and just like that, they did.

"What the...!" Moira exclaimed.

"I know, I saw it too," Beast was just as startled.

"The radiation spike, all of it, everythin'... just gone!"

"The atoms reverted to their original state the moment Harry was no longer exerting his presence on them," said Beast. "Not even any trace left over. Extraordinary! Harry's using, for lack of a better term, _clean plasma_! I'll need to run further tests to be sure, but I can hypothesize that Harry is exuding some manner of aura, or force from either his body or his mind that is _purposely_ exciting the particles and atoms of matter around him, creating the plasma almost as an after effect."

Professor X smiled, and turned back to his newest pupil, "Harry, we're going to try a few more tests, so if you would, please bear with us a little while longer." Harry just shrugged. After all, it wasn't like he had anything better to do, other than study magic with Wanda, and while that was fun some of the time, it wasn't _all_ that he wanted to be doing day after day.

Soon he was learning more than just controlling his powers, but also learning how to use them, disciplining his control until he could control every spark, form a plasma mist, the full plasma flame, and he was even able to formulate a specific type of plasma, or rather radiation as Moira and Beast called it.

Before the afternoon was completely out, Wanda stole him away for some more magic tutoring, and then Beast and Moira had finally devised the tests they wanted to run on Harry, so he went back to the Lab for a bit more of that, and they learned a little bit more about his physiology and how his powers worked. Then it was dinner time, where those in residence, despite already knowing most of the answers, asked him how his day went and answered any questions he still had about things. They also told stories, some embarrassing, some terrifying, and some just plain funny.

In short, they did everything in their power to give Harry the family that he'd been denied for most of his life, all while helping him to better himself and take control of his destiny.

That was the pattern for the next week or so; waking up, breakfast, magic, lunch, Danger Room, magic, Lab, magic, dinner, going to bed. Then, something happened over in the States, and Professor X and most of the present X-Men had to leave one day. Wanda stayed behind, however, to continue his magic tutoring and to make him as fully prepared for the world of magic as possible.

Only those that either lived or worked at the Center were left, meaning Banshee, Madrox, Kitty, Forge, Dr. MacTaggert, Wolfsbane and Nightcrawler. Beast and the others had to go back with the Professor and the Center was much quieter for a time, though Harry's schedule remained the same, and Wanda's lessons grew more and more complicated as he slowly advanced in knowledge.

A week after his arrival, Harry was spending some time after his early afternoon lesson with Wanda walking along the beach that was a short walk from the Research Center. It wasn't exactly a prime vacation spot, as the stretch of sand didn't even reach a full mile, and it was more a collection of eroded rocks than an actual beach, but it was still a place of peace and quiet amongst nature, where Harry could be alone with his thoughts and try to work everything out in his head.

It was while he was tossing stones into the crashing waves that he finally took notice that he wasn't as alone as he thought he'd been. "Oh, sorry," he apologized the moment he noticed the rather striking barefoot woman standing a few feet away from him.

"That's all right," she replied with a soft British accent, picking up a stone herself and tossing it the same way he did. "You looked like you were thinking very intently."

"Yeah, guess I was a million miles away there for a second, wasn't I?" he grinned.

She looked at him, an expression of pure confusion contorting her face for a few moments as she replied, "No, you were right here. I was watching you. What were you thinking about? It seemed to make you sad... and lonely."

Harry looked at her, and for a brief moment wanted to scream at her that it was private and none of her business. Seeing how her hair seemed to almost wilt and her skin tightened up a bit, the impulse left him, and he sighed, turning largely back to his own thoughts.

"Mostly I was just thinking over how weird my life's gotten lately," he finally answered her, chucking a stone a bit harder than previously, sending it flying in a high arc.

"One day, out of the blue, I get my first letter, ever, from somebody I don't even know, even if it was just a school letter... it was mine. Then Vernon had to go and tear it up, and my mutant power manifested, and before I know it, I'm in a beautiful, wonderful place where the people are kind, they care about me, they want me to better myself, and to top it all off, I find out that I'm a wizard, and not just any wizard, but one of the most famous wizards there is. All because of something that happened when I was a baby, something I can't even remember, except through half-forgotten nightmares!"

The woman was silent for a time after Harry stopped talking, he continued to throw stones into the sea.

"And thinking about all that, it makes you sad?" she asked him.

"It scares me," he finally admitted. "I'm almost eleven years old... and all this has already happened to me. What's going to happen to me next? Will I find out some other great secret about myself that everybody but me knew? Am I an alien too? It's just... It's all just too much."

"You are... overwhelmed?" she seemed to be asking herself as much as him.

"You could say that," he sighed.

Looking at her again, he felt a sense of gratitude suddenly, and casually noticed how her cheeks grew rosy and her long hair shone with golden brilliance. "Uh, thanks for listening. I guess I just needed to unload a bit there. Where are my manners? Here I am, telling you all my problems, and we haven't even been properly introduced." He held out his hand, "I'm Harry Potter."

"I am Meggan," she answered as she took his hand with a smile. "You are a good person."

He blushed, and shrugged. He wasn't so used to getting compliments from beautiful women that he never quite knew what to do or say to them when they gave him one. Offhandedly, he couldn't help but notice that even as he looked at this strange woman, she seemed to grow even more beautiful.

"Uh, thanks, I guess," he finally mumbled. "You live here on the island?"

She nodded, smiling energetically at him.

"Well, I'm staying at the Mutant Research Center, at least for the time being. You ever been there?"

She nodded again, before answering enigmatically, "Yes. Moira is a good friend, and Brian likes to help her and her other friends out every now and again."

Feeling a momentary flash of jealousy that this beautiful girl already had a boyfriend, not that he was old enough for that kind of thing yet, he asked curiously, "Who's Brian?"

"Meggan! There you are!" a loud British voice called out from behind them. They turned and Harry saw the tallest, strongest-looking man he had ever seen walking towards them. He was _almost_ as tall as Hagrid, but Hagrid was big all around, whereas this man mostly had big muscles.

"Hi Brian!" Meggan squealed before lightly leaping into the big man's arms. "This is Harry Potter."

"Ah, the infamous Mr. Harry Potter. We meet at last," the man smiled warmly, putting Meggan back on the ground as he held out his hand to Harry, who immediately took it, despite his own being dwarfed by the man's. "My name is Brian Braddock. I see that you've already met Meggan. I've heard a lot about you, from multiple sources. Wanda is quite taken with you actually. If you're not careful, she might adopt you some day."

"Can't really see that as being a bad thing, sir," Harry casually retorted.

Brian laughed.

"Please, call me Brian. So what brings you out here, this beautiful day?" he asked the young wizard.

Harry just shrugged, then finally answered, "Just needed some place quiet to think. About things."

Rather than warning him off, rebuking him, or even asking him about what he was thinking about, Brian just nodded his head, understanding, and said, "I see. Well, sometimes we all need a bit of time by ourselves to think things through. Especially after a traumatic event, like say being uprooted from the home you've known all your life and finding yourself here. Learning your a mutant and a wizard, all in the same day. And who knows what all else. If you would like, we can leave you be..."

"No, it's all right. Meggan and I were just introducing ourselves, and it's not like I claimed a stake at the beach or anything. Are you two living at the Center too, or are you just here on the island?" he asked. "Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to pry."

"That's all right, Harry," Brian laughed again. "Fair's fair, I say. And actually, we're more... leasing here at the Center. It's not really our home, but it's where we're staying for right now. And we like to help out Dr. MacTaggert every now and again, when she needs it. OR sometimes it's Professor Xavier and his X-Men that we'll be helping out. Mostly, we just like to be available for whoever does need our help, when it's needed."

"Sounds brilliant," Harry commented as they began the trek back to the Center.

"Ah, Harry, there ye are," Moira exclaimed when she saw the young mutant walking in with two of her more powerful guests, "Ah was wonderin' where ye'd gotten yerself off to. Ah see ye've finally met Brian and Meggan. They're... guests I s'pose, here at the Research Center."

"Yeah, Brian told me all about it here. Did you need something Dr. MacTaggert?" Harry asked.

"Sorta," the auburn-haired doctor shrugged mysteriously. "Ah was wonderin' if ye'd care to come for yer afternoon session a bit earlier than usual. Ah've got somethin' that might impress ye."

"Cool," he said, trying out something he'd heard Nightcrawler use a few times, "Is it OK for Brian and Meggan to come along? If you guys want to, that is?"

Brian just shrugged and looked questioningly at Moira, while Meggan and Harry both had on their puppy-dog pouts. Moira just laughed at their antics, and nodded her head. "O'course they can come. 'Specially since it's yer session, and ye just invited them. They have te stay in the Control Room, though."

"Great!" Harry enthusiastically ran ahead on the path to the Danger Room.

_Danger Room Prototype_

"_All right Harry,_" Moira's voice came from over the speakers while Harry himself stood in the middle of the floor, "_This is mostly te test yer concentration. Remember when we had ye firin' plasma bolts the other day? Well this time, ah want ye to focus on hittin' the targets. Think of it as a shootin' gallery._"

Harry frowned and asked, "What's a shooting gallery?"

The speakers suddenly cut off and he thought he saw some furious motions coming from the control room, but he couldn't make it out clearly. Finally, the speakers came back on, but this time it was Brian who was speaking.

"_Don't worry about it, Harry_. _Just have fun and hit as many of the targets as you possibly can. It'll get harder the further you get, so be ready, all right? OK, here we go._"

Moments later, a large holographic target appeared in front of Harry. Without hesitation, he formed and shot off a bolt of plasma from his hands, hitting the large target dead-center. It immediately disappeared and another target, a bit further away, took it's place. He quickly shot it out too.

"_Here's where it gets harder, Harry,_" Brian warned him. "_Now don't get frustrated if you miss. Each target will remain until you hit it, but also each target will be getting smaller and further away and generally just harder to hit._"

Brian was right, Harry noted, as the targets grew progressively smaller and further away. He still had a bit of an issue with distance, as the plasma bolts would sometimes fizzle out on him before reaching a distant target. When that happened, he grew frustrated and concentrated harder, pushing more power into the bolts. Sometimes it helped, allowing the bolt to last long enough to hit, other times it made no difference as it just blew up instead of fizzling, still not reaching the target.

The fifth time this happened on a single target, Harry stopped. He realized that just pushing more plasma, more power basically, into the bolts wasn't working. He needed to think this through, like when dealing with Dudley and his gang. Sometimes just running away worked, other times avoiding them was best but not always possible. Yet other times hiding was the only option, and therein one had to do a lot of thinking.

After all, finding the perfect hiding spot is useless if the bullies see you going into the hiding spot, and some hiding spots were completely the wrong sort given a certain situation, so Harry often was forced think on his feet and to use his brain in such situations and rely upon more than just gut instinct as well.

Right now, the way his bolts worked, he just formed balls of plasma, and then threw them, somehow making them self-propelling too. While that could make for a big explosion he'd noticed, it wasn't good for target practice. In fact, the only thing that he was aware of that was good for target practice, was a bow and arrow. Safe to say any bow he picked up wouldn't last long, but maybe he wouldn't need to.

Arrows fly through the air because they're aerodynamic, the shaft and arrowhead allowing less wind resistance than a giant ball. His bolts were already self-propelling, so they perhaps could be self-guiding too?

"_Everything all right, Harry?_" Brian asked after the boy had been still for over a minute.

"Yeah!" he called back. "Yeah... I think I've got it now."

Then he raised his hand again, but this time instead of a ball of plasma, he began to focus it down into a thin arrow shaft, coming to a point at the tip. It was a bit different, not harder, just different, but pretty soon he fired his new type plasma bolt and it moved almost five times as fast, hitting the target he'd been missing before, almost as soon as he blinked. It switched out with a much harder and distant target.

"Cool," Harry decided that he liked Nightcrawler's word, and he fired off his new plasma bolt again.

Up in the control room, Moira was only just beginning to calm down, especially after she saw how Harry had demonstrated that he was beginning to learn how to use his powers more effectively all on his own without them having to come up with exercise after exercise and telling him exactly what to do. She almost allowed herself to feel a mother's pride, but restrained herself.

"He's doing very well," Meggan said to the auburn-haired doctor.

She nodded. "Aye, he is. He's also figured out how te increase the accuracy and speed of his bolts already. Ah was afraid he'd need somebody te go in and show'im how te do that. And he's made this kind of progress, on his own, within a week! And he's not even officially eleven years old yet!"

"It is impressive," Brian 'Captain Britain' Braddock was forced to admit, "but I think he can do much better. Harry," he clicked on the speakers while he made some further adjustments to the controls, "I'm going to move you up to the next level, this time there will be two targets, and you have to hit them simultaneously, all right? If you hit one and miss the other, they'll remain there until you do. Ready? Begin!"

"What are ye doin'!" Moira shouted. "He's not ready fer that! Ah wasn't plannin' on him doin' this kind of thing until tomorrow! At the earliest!"

"He's ready for it," Brian replied, pointing down at the Danger Room, where Harry was now blasting away with both hands, twin targets disappearing almost as soon as they appeared.

Soon, Harry began to sweat a bit, as his concentration was taxed beyond anything he'd ever had to do before now. Forming the arrow-bolts had been a mild challenge, but nothing to strain over. Firing them from both hands so that both targets were hit at the same time was a bit more of a challenge, but more in having to do it over and over again rather than doing it at all. Still, pretty soon he was actually improving his score as he never missed the target. He might miss the center, but he always managed to hit the target. After about ten minutes, a chime went out through the Danger Room and no more targets appeared.

"_Nicely done Harry!_" Brian complimented the boy, making him blush just a bit. "_Ready for the next level?_" he was asked. Harry just grinned and nodded his head, expecting three or four targets this time.

"_This is going to be a bit different, and there's no time limit, as the objective is to do it right, rather than quick. It's still just two targets, but they're not going to appear next to each other every time. In fact, they'll be appearing randomly all over the room, but you still have to hit them simultaneously, all right?_" Brian explained the level of the exercise.

Harry just nodded, setting his stance and sparking his plasma flame, the bluish-white aura that appeared around him whenever he was manipulating plasma fields. Soon, the targets appeared on either side of him. Pointing out both his arms, he fired and hit both dead center. Then the targets appeared in completely different locations, and it got progressively harder after that, as they did not always appear in his line-of-sight, so sometimes he spent minutes just looking for both targets and ways of hitting them at the same time.

Still, he managed to complete the course before too long, and he'd been getting ideas for a new way to fire his bolts that he wanted to try out. After the chime sounded, he asked, before Brian could even speak, "Can we try the next level? Please? I want to see how good I can be!"

Chuckling, the large blond man shrugged and looked over a Moira, who smiled wistfully down at the young boy, who was probably having the time of his life doing _exercise_! Finally, she nodded at the man, and he clicked on the speakers.

"_Sure thing, Harry. There's one last exercise that doesn't have a time limit for it. We'll get that out of the way now, what d'ya say? All right, here we go. This time the targets will start off few, but they will exponentially increase for each one that you hit. First will be one, then two, then four, then eight, sixteen, thirty-two, and so on, got it? It's not a requirement that you hit them simultaneously, but see how close to that you can get, all right?_" Harry nodded to indicate he was ready.

The first target was rather large and right in front of him, he didn't even bother and threw an "old-style" plasma ball at it, making it vanish. Then two medium-sized targets popped up, and he extended both hands and blasted them with arrow-bolts. Then, much smaller, four targets hovered a short distance away. Harry smiled as he tried out his new version plasma bolt that he'd just come up with.

It was actually two arrows twisted around each other, formed from one hand, and then fired so that about halfway to the target, they would split off and hit another two targets. Forming two of these 'twist-bolts', he fired at the four targets, and was pleased at how well his new technique worked out as all four were hit. Then eight targets appeared all around him.

Another thing he'd been thinking over was, did he really _have_ to use his hands to shoot out plasma bolts? After all, the plasma was surrounding his entire body, so why couldn't it come out of his back, or his elbows, or even the bottom of his feet? Focusing on exactly where each target was in relation to his position, so he knew where to aim, he focused on the plasma field around him, until there was a corona of electric fire around him, and from there, numerous plasma bolts shot out and hit each target dead-center at the exact same time. The same happened with sixteen targets. When thirty-two targets appeared all over the room, he did the same thing again, but this time with the twist-bolts, and again, each was hit at the same time.

When sixty-four targets appeared, Harry took a moment to take a breath. He had little doubt that it could be done, but he wasn't sure of his ability to do so. Dudley's grades were a lot worse than Harry's in school, who usually brought home A's and B's, where as Dudley seemed to like his initials a little too much by bringing home D's and an occasional C in Sports. As such, Harry had always been punished for outshining his dimwitted cousin and never received any praise for doing well in his studies. Furthermore, the few times he did get compliments they were only from teachers, and it was when he disappointed them by not turning in homework, or missing a question that had been on the test, it was then that he felt the worst of all as he felt that he'd let them down in some way and that it was all his fault.

The X-Men, Dr. MacTaggert, even Brian and Meggan who he'd just met, they'd all been so wonderful to him, and he _did not want to __**let them DOWN!**_

With a scream of effort and mixed emotions, Harry hunkered down and the plasma flame around him increased to five times the strength he'd had it at earlier. Then, with an effort of supreme will and concentration, individual lightning bolts shot out from the sun that was Harry Potter, and each and every one of the sixty-four bolts of lightning/plasma shot out and struck all sixty-four targets at the exact same moment. The same happened again for the next 128 targets, and then the 256 after that, and even the 512 after that! Unfortunately, when the counter hit 1,024 targets, Harry faltered again, not making to strike a single one until the plasma field around him ignited so bright and so hot that the automatic shutters around the control room blinded those inside to what was happening in the room. The radiation meter inside also detected that Harry's plasma was approaching readings to those of solar winds during a Solar Flare storm.

The cameras, thankfully, were still working, and seeing as they were holographic and made to work in outer space _in_ a Solar Flare storm, the occupants of the control room were still able to view what Harry was doing, which seemed to be creating almost a thousand bolts of ball-lightning and then sending them out to each target before simultaneously striking them all once again. Then the targets increased to 2,048, and he did that again, but after that with 4,096 targets, filling almost the entire room with nothing but holographic targets, he could do only one thing, which is exactly what he did.

He blew up the Danger Room the same way he blew up his Aunt's house. As a result, no more targets appeared because all the holographic generators had been overloaded and blown up.

"What is this kid?" Brian asked, in awe as he watched the read-out.

"First things first, Braddock," Moira shouted, "Let's check on Harry, make sure he's alright!"

Together the three rushed into the Danger Room itself, and were more than a bit stunned to see just how badly it was damaged. Not that the Danger Room being damaged was a new experience, in fact it usually broke at least once a week, either from an over enthusiastic user, or from the general wear and tear of shooting out missiles and lasers and everything as the standard obstacle course.

Thankfully, as when Kurt found him in the crater that had been his Aunt's kitchen, Harry was completely unharmed, barely even dirty beyond a little sweat. As proof that his control was much improved, he was already conscious, where he'd been out for over two hours the first time he'd gone 'supernova', however the first words out of his mouth were more than a bit disconcerting.

"I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I'm sorry..."

"Harry, it's all right," Brian spoke first.

"Aye, he's right Harry," Moira added, "Tis nuthin we haven't had te deal with a hundred times over by now. Ye should see how the place looks after Wolverine gets done with the place."

"I... I-I'm sorry..." he said one final time, sitting up, looking around. "Did I... did I fail?"

Moira's heart was on the verge of breaking, but Brian started laughing, sparking a moment of fury at the callous Brit. Until he explained why he was laughing, "Harry! Fail? Are you having me on? You're the first one that's _passed_ that exercise with the maximum score possible! Not even Cyclops, Xavier's first student, after his _years_ of experience could do what you just did! You actually _overloaded_ the system! Harry, you're some kind of whizkid to be able to do all this!"

"But..."

"Brian's right," Meggan chirped, smiling as means of making the boy not be sad anymore. "You did not fail. There was no fail. You also did not destroy the place, which you could have, but did not. You demonstrated your control and ability to use your powers in different and imaginative ways. You did not fail."

"Oh," Harry blinked, a bit stunned as he'd tried so hard to not fail, and where he thought he had, he suddenly found out that he did not fail, in fact he'd blown out the top record on his first try.

"C'mon, whizkid," Brian helped him to his feet, "I owe you an ice cream or two. Tomorrow, if you want, we'll start up on some physical exercises. If you're able to control your powers to this degree now, I look forward to when you're older and in better condition."

"Hey! I just got here a week ago! Why is everybody calling me a scrawny little git, anyway?" Harry mock-protested. Brian gave him a weird look, then laughed at the 'That was a joke' face the kid wore.

"I meant condition of your muscles and body. With the proper conditioning, we could have you ready for the Olympics before puberty sets in! Which reminds me, I need to get together with Steve, Logan and Thor for our monthly arm-wrestling match."

"Who're they?" Harry asked.

"Oh, just some friends of mine. I'll be sure to introduce them the next time they're on the island," Brian promised. "In the meantime, since Forge, Beast and Moira are no doubt going to be busy for the rest of the day, how about we sneak out of here to have a run on the village ice cream parlor?"

"YEAH!" Harry _and_ Meggan both cheered.

_Mutant Research Center Lab_

_Later that night_

Moira wasn't sure if she needed it or not, but just to be on the safe side, she took a couple pills of aspirin and washed it down with a chug of the pink stuff. She was looking over the results of the testing on Harry Potter's Danger Room exercises.

Theoretically, with every other case of 'plasma' that the entire world had with it being biologically created, it more often than not had the habit of bursting into flame when brought into contact with open air, usually creating a variation of the 'Human Torch' effect as many called it. Even those that created plasma through various means of technology, if it was directed down the barrel of a gun or cannon of some kind, if exposed to an open atmosphere, it burst into flame.

Then along comes this ten-year-old kid, young for a mutant but not unheard of, and instead of generating the plasma internally, he _converts_ all the matter around him into free-flowing ionic and non-ionic plasma that is comparable to _star plasma_! He creates his own personal _Aurora Borealis_ and bolts of lightning and just an hour ago, he nearly turns himself into his very own _astronomical star_!

Thankfully, the damage was minimal. Forge and Beast were both hard at work repairing the prototype, and last she had seen of them they were both talking about adding in a few extra features they'd been thinking over since the last upgrade. There was a reason that Moira got the _prototype_ Danger Room, while Charles got the working and tested model over at his school.

It wasn't the scientific impossibility of Harry's powers that had her so stressed, however, as when dealing with mutants, one had to come to expect the unexplainable as normal. It wasn't even how he seemed so dejected and ashamed of himself afterwards, though that was admittedly part of it. It was how _developed_ his powers were! Most mutants, especially after manifesting the first time, usually have an adjustment period to go through, sometimes a week, sometimes a few years, time for them to get used to their powers, how they work, even how to control and turn them on and off, if that's even possible.

Harry had moved through that adjustment period in less than a day.

He'd manifested in the early morning, blowing up a house in Surrey. He woke up a few hours later in the observation ward, discovered he was a mutant and shortly after a wizard as well. Instead of denying either, he embraced both wholeheartedly and displayed a healthy amount of enthusiasm in wanting to learn more about both, the former in controlling his powers, the latter about learning more of his heritage and magic. By the evening, when they were giving him his check up, he was already demonstrating fine-control by creating a single spark between his fingertips and was starting to experiment on his own with what he could do.

Now... a week, a _week_ after his powers manifested and he'd come to the Center, he was demonstrating _full_ _control_ over his mutant powers and was beginning to think outside the box and was displaying an innate ingenuity in how to further his mastery of them without any prompting from them!

According to Wanda, his magical studies were equally impressive, but nothing to make noise over. He read and understood as was typical for any boy of his age group and power level. He'd even done what she called, "A few basic spells." Spells that, as far as Moira was concerned, mimicked the abilities of telekinesis, psychokinesis, and transfiguration!

She needed to talk to Charles about this.

Turning from one computer screen to the next, she opened the line and within a minute, she had a live video conference connection with Professor X.

"Hello Moira, what can I do for you? Is Beast ready to come home yet?" Charles greeted her warmly.

"No, ye cannae have him back, I'm keepin' him all to meself!" she joked back. "This is actually about Harry, Charles. I want ye te have a look at somethin here." She then switched back to the first screen and transferred a few files over the secured connection. "These are the results of his latest Danger Room session."

"Top scores, not bad," Charles read.

"Not bad? _Not bad_! Charles, he damn near _destroyed_ every record that was ever set fer the Target Exercises! We took him up te Level _Thirteen_, Charles! _Thirteen_!"

"That's not possible," Charles argued back.

"We dinnae run him through the Timed courses, only the actual Target Practice set. He hit _every_ single one of'em dead center. Every bloody one! Now I'll admit, stationary targets don't happen very often in real life, but he still hit every single one in the bulls eye! Charles, the boy's a bloody natural."

"I'm forced to agree. Usually progress like this, even without the timed portion, isn't seen until the person has had almost a year to get used to their powers. Did Harry say or do anything unusual after?"

"Aye, ye could say that," Moira groused. "He apologized. Profusely."

"Well, I'm sure that..."

"We told him it wasn't his fault, and the next words out of his mouth was he wanted to know if he failed," she interrupted him. "_Failed_! Look at those scores, Charles. And he was tryin' so hard, and the first thing he does is apologize fer disappointing us and then askin' if he failed."

"I see that our young Mr. Potter has invoked your maternal instincts, Moira," Charles teased. "In the mean time, while we have him with us, we need to make sure that Harry has full control over his abilities. He leaves for school on September 1st. Much as I wish I could bring him to my school, both Dumbledore and Wanda insist that he needs to go to Hogwarts for his magical education, and I'm forced to agree. Wanda herself went to Hogwarts and nobody can deny her talents."

"That's the thing, Charles," Moira said, exasperated, "Harry's not just in control of his powers, he's almost advanced in their use! Ye said it yerself, those scores are of somebody with a year of experience. I don't know how he's doin' it, but tis clear that he's got control. Unless he wants te, or loses his temper somethin fierce, he won't be killin' or hurtin' anyone. I'm more concerned about his mental capacity, te be honest."

"Mental capacity?" he repeated, growing concerned.

"Charles! It's just not right fer somebody te be this beat down! Ah dinnae care what ye say about me feelin's fer the boy, but the way he's been actin', like he's waitin' fer the other shoe te drop, ah just don't know what te do about that," Moira confessed.

"I have a feeling," Charles comforted his friend, "that Harry is a lot more resilient than either you or I am fully aware of. I know there aren't a lot of other guests there that are the same age, but that doesn't mean we can't still be Harry's friends. Now, on another matter... is everything prepared?"

"Cake tis on its way, and presents are bein' bought, or made, all around. Have ye taken care of the guest list?" she asked.

"I've cleared everyone's schedule, and called in a few reservists to fill the vacuum for the day. Does he suspect?" he asked in return.

She snorted, before her temper flared once more. "Are ye kiddin'? It'll be more of a surprise te him than everythin' else we've given him already. Ah know of yer pacifist views, Charles, but isn't there somethin than ye can do, or maybe drop a line te somebody _willin_' te do somethin about those damned relatives of his?"

"Moira," Professor X chastened the doctor.

"All right, all right, ferget I asked. Spoilsport."

"Love you too. See you in a few days time." With that, the connection was closed.

TBC...


	5. Birthday

_Muir Island_

_Mutant Research Center_

_Wednesday, July 31_

The morning of his birthday, Harry didn't suspect a thing out of the ordinary. He'd gone to bed the night before without a worry in the world, his belly was full from a large and healthy supper, and he'd worn himself to exhaustion with the added benefits of physical exercises with Brian, Meggan, and the other more dexterous and physical-based mutants at the Center.

Sometimes he only kept track of it for the simple purpose of keeping up with his own age, occasionally drawing himself a birthday cake like he saw Dudley get every year. Not that he ate it or anything like that, but sometimes it was nice to make wishes on the depicted candles.

This year, his life was wholly different, more different than anything his life had ever resembled before. So he had no reason to draw himself a birthday cake and make wishes of drawn candles, because he literally had more than he could ever wish for even now.

Needless to say, he was _very_ surprised when he got to the dining hall and the moment he stepped through the entrance, everybody in there shouted out loud, "HAPPY BIRTHDAY HARRY!"

"AAHHH!" he screamed out loud, nearly charging the air with a plasma field, but he had enough control of his instincts to keep that from happening. He was grateful for that as when he saw what was before him, he nearly wept with joy. All of the Center's staff, the mutants there with him, some of the X-Men, and even Brian, Meggan and Hagrid were all there, standing around a rather large lightning-bolt shaped cake and a small pile of presents that could've rivaled anything Dudley ever got for any of his eleven birthdays.

He couldn't care less about the presents though, as his eyes were all on the people, every last one of them looking at him with friendship and even something akin to love in their eyes and faces. It blew every dream he'd ever had of a birthday clear out of existence.

"Thanks everyone," he finally said, choking up just a bit. "I don't know what to say."

"How about 'Don't let Jamie eat all of my birthday cake', to start with?" Forge offered.

"Good starting point," Harry agreed, getting over his overload of emotions and laughing a bit. "Madrox, stay the _bloody hell_ away from my cake, and if you touch my presents, I'll set all the women loose on ya!"

"Oh, and how would you do that, half-pint?" Kitty argued back with the kid she was starting to view as a little brother. He was, as of today, only five years younger than her.

"Simple, promise to help you drag him and all his duplicates on a shopping spree and makeover," Harry answered without missing a beat.

"I'll be good!" Multiple Man squeaked out from the back of the room.

The whole room exploded in laughter as Harry raced forward to check out his, _his_ birthday cake! It was almost unreal to the now eleven-year-old. And then the pile of presents, and all the people. Come to think of it, now that he was taking a second look around, he realized that he _didn't_ know all of the people present.

Turning to the most noticeable of them all, Harry looked over at the almost as tall as Hagrid, strong looking blond man standing next to Brian. Noticing this, Brian stepped forward with the man to introduce him.

"Harry, I'd like you to meet a good friend of mine. His name is Thor. Thor, Harry Potter," the superhero known as Captain Britain introduce the God of Thunder to the Boy Who Lived.

"Tis an honour to meet one such as yourself, young warrior," Thor bowed even with his waist.

"Nice to meet you," Harry replied politely, while holding out his hand.

"A pleasure as well," Thor accepted the small hand gently into his mighty fist. Neither could miss that the moment they touched, a bolt of lightning connected them and almost fused their hands together. Thor smiled and nodded his head at the young boy. "If you ever require Thor's presence, young warrior, simply cry out my name to the trembling heavens and ask for my help, and I shall be there to give it. It is my oath to you."

Surprised, Harry blinked, but smiled anyway and said impulsively, "Thank you. And if you ever need my help, just ask and I'll do my best too!"

More surprisingly, Thor did not laugh, instead he looked seriously down on the young mutant wizard and nodded his head again. "I am sure that you will, young warrior. I look forward to your future adventures."

Then he turned and let Brian introduce a few more people, most notably those that were still part of the 'we' of Meggan and Brian's group that he hadn't met yet, which included Brian's sister Betsy Braddock, codenamed Psylocke, and Alison Blaire aka Dazzler. It was also finally explained to him that Kitty, Nightcrawler, Colossus, and Colossus' sister Illyana Rasputin were not members of the X-Men as Beast, Professor X and others were. With the exception of the girl that was only two years older than himself, they were actually apart of an England-based group called _Excalibur_.

After all of the introductions had been done, they all insisted on singing 'Happy Birthday' to him, with a multitude of humorous anecdotes thrown in by various parties, but it was all in good fun. Then, at the insistence of 2-to-1 voting, the cry went up for presents, so Harry decided to just grab the first one off the top of the pile, which actually happened to be a potted plant with a card tied to the pot, claiming it as being from Meggan.

"Wow," he breathed, taking in the long stalk and the vivid orange-red colors of the petals.

"It's a lily," Meggan said to him, smiling as he kept staring at the plant. "It likes you. Do you like it?"

Absently, he nodded, while answering just loud enough to be heard, "My mum's name was Lily..."

"Ah," Beast spoke as he came up behind the two, remarking on the plant, "_Lilium bulbiferum_, also called the Orange Lily, or Fire Lily. A most auspicious plant for a gift, and most lovely, I must admit."

"Thank you, Meggan," Harry said to the giver of the gift, and made sure to put the plant where it wouldn't get trampled on.

"Next! My gift!" Nightcrawler was unusually exuberant as he teleported from the pile to the ceiling, holding the gift out to Harry with a wide grin on his blue-skinned face.

"All right, all right," Harry laughed and opened the wrapping.

It went much like that for the rest of the time, some demanding he open their presents next, others simply waiting patiently for him to move through the pile, until he was to the last few gifts. They weren't all emotional stoppers like Meggan's gift had been, instead many were more useful, while others were just plain silly, but appreciated all the more because of it.

In the final count, as Jamie called it; Nightcrawler had given him a couple of books, which were called mangas, these were of a series called One Piece. Wanda got him a gyroscope looking device that she called a Sneak'o'scope, it sounded an alarm anytime somebody nearby was doing something untrustworthy towards the owner. In demonstration, Harry put it next to the cake and less than a minute later a high-pitched whistling sound erupted and everyone turned to look at Jamie sneaking a lick of the cake.

Brian gave him another series of mangas, well actually a set of several series, from Ranma ½, Dragonball, Ninja Scroll, Inu-yasha, BLEACH, and Naruto. Sean, on the other hand, gave him a single disc that they were both assured by Forge, held a comprehensive collection of numerous anime titles, and given that it was one disc and Banshee was saying there were over thirty-five _complete series_ on that one disc, not counting the movies, the OVAs, and the Special Features, that's pretty impressive. Colossus got him a picture book and then three other 'How-to-draw' books, the latter in "How to draw Manga", "How to draw Anime", and "How to draw Superheroes" while the picture book, Harry was surprised to find individual images of numerous characters, all drawn anime/manga style, but what really surprised him was that they were all signed by Colossus as the artist. Illyana, almost embarrassed after her brother's gift, had him open hers, which was a simple figurine of a boy wizard waving a wand. It was beautiful, and Harry told her so, placing it next to his flower from Meggan.

Wolfsbane got him a set of herbal soaps, claiming she wasn't sure what to get him. Kitty, Betsy and Alison all got him clothes, but they fit and he needed more t-shirts and jeans anyway, so he thanked them, seeing as he'd never gotten more than Dudley's hand-me-downs before this. Moira got him what she called, "Some ole thing ah had lyin' around, gatherin' dust." It turned out to be one of the advanced medical scanners that they'd managed to beg off their alien allies, and only the fact that Beast and Forge both had an even more advanced model to play with was she allowed to hand it out. It was also simple to use, basically what was put into a field trauma kit for medics during any kind of conflict. Harry, while appreciating the value, hoped that he would never have to use it.

Beast and Forge actually gave him two gifts each, one of which was a combo gift from the two of them together, and then another gift for each of them. The one from both of them was a small little cube that had a big red button on the top of it. They explained that when he pressed that button, whatever room he was currently in would be transformed into it's own mini-Danger Room. It didn't have safety features or shielding, but it would let him keep up with basic exercises. It also acted as a personal holosuite, allowing Harry to pretty much go anyplace he desired just by pressing a button.

Beast also gave him a book, but not a manga unfortunately. It's title was "Compilation of William Shakespeare's Greatest Works" and it was the size of a small dictionary. Harry gave him a funny look afterwards, but Beast went on to explain that Shakespeare's words had done more to help him in coping with the harshness of reality in more ways than anyone else could imagine. Harry promised to read it. Eventually.

Forge, gave him a new pair of glasses, in three sets. When they came to the high-tech looking sunglasses, Forge immediately had him put them away, saying he'd explain later, while a few of the women were giving the older mutant some suspicious glares.

Jamie gave him another few issues of mangas that the others hadn't given him yet, and what was still missing from his collection, the others quickly filled in so that for every title that he owned, he had nearly every issue that was available to be bought. Hagrid, unfortunately couldn't add to his collection, but he did give him a neat little pouch that he called 'mokeskin' that anything that was placed in that pouch could only be removed by the one that placed it in there. Finally, Professor Xavier gave him another book, this one called "The Once and Future King" by T.H. White, saying he can read it whenever, but likewise with Beast, Charles had found it to be a much vaunted and valuable read.

Finally, after all the presents had been opened, they tore into the cake and other party food that had been gathered. Soon, the girls talked Harry into trying on a few of their gifts, and after that Sean talked everyone into an anime marathon and lead the way into the Big Screen Room, which was actually the briefing room, and Wanda took a moment to "demonstrate" the magic Harry would eventually be doing by transfiguring the conference table and a few other things into comfortable couches for them all to sit on. It surprised many there when Illyana pulled out her own wand and then transfigured her own chair into a plushy recliner.

"Are you going to Hogwarts too?" Harry couldn't help asking the older girl.

She smiled and shook her head, her Russian accent as thick as her brother's. "No, I am afraid I go to a different magic school. Russia is not as powerful as it once was, but we do have our magical elite, the same as everyone. Unfortunately, there are only three primary magic schools in all of Europe; Hogwarts, Beaubaxtons, and my school, Durmstrang. It is not so bad, though it is in the north, so it can be very cold at times. They're admissions are also very light, so I do not have to worry so long as I keep my grades up."

"That's funny," Harry frowned, "Professor Dumbledore and Wanda never said anything about admissions fee... Is it because of..." he absently pointed to his forehead.

Illyana giggled, and shook her head. "No, though in a way yes. Your parents were both magical, yes?"

Harry just shrugged, and repeated what Wanda had told him weeks ago. "My father was a wizard, and my mother was the first witch of her family. So... I guess."

Illyana nodded. "The way it is spoken of, you are what is called a half-blood. I am like what your mother must have been, with neither of my parents being a witch or wizard. I have heard it called... muggle-born. Because none of my parents were magical, I am on what is called a scholarship. So long as I meet the grade requirements for the year, all my expenses are paid for by the government. Once I graduate, I can either take a position within the magical government, or I can fashion my own business within the magical world. There are so few who can use magic across the world that those willing to join it are well taken care of."

"Sounds brilliant," Harry grinned at her, and she back at him. Then the anime started and they were occupied with the adventures of a young girl who accidentally opened a magic book and had to go on a quest to capture all the magical cards that had escaped with a plushy winged lion at her side.

_Kings Cross Station_

_Downtown London_

_September 1__st_

"Oh Mum, honestly!" Hermione Jean Granger complained to her parents, but her mother, Jane McCoy Granger especially. Although the way her father, Kenneth R. Granger immediately hugged her tight the moment his wife was done didn't cut him any slack. "Dad!"

"I'm sorry, it's just here you are, off to school and it's going to be a year before I see you again," he cried.

"I'll be back for Christmas," Hermione told him, trying very hard not to cry herself.

"Are you sure you don't want us to come with you? I mean to help you get your things on the train," her mother asked once more.

"Honestly Dad, I can handle one trunk by myself," Giving her parents an exasperated look, she shook her head, speaking over her shoulder as she pushed her trolley towards the designated barrier her letter had told her to look for. It had actually been an extra note that was put in by the Deputy Headmistress, not part of the letter itself.

"Besides, I honestly don't think you'll be able to get through the barrier, it is magically sealed to prevent ordinary people from accidentally stumbling through it, you know," she quoted the note that'd been in her letter.

"Well, still," her mother took one last chance to hold her daughter, "we'll miss you. Be good, clean your teeth after every meal and before bed. Make lots of friends, and have fun, baby girl."

"Mum!" Hermione screeched, only to be assaulted by her father again, who had to be forcibly removed by her mother before he finally let her go.

"Have fun, sweetheart!" he managed to get out. She smiled at them, turned towards the barrier, and took a deep breath, before turning again and running back to her parents and hugging them with every fiber of her being. She was an only child, and while she was embarrassed by their behavior, they were still her parents.

Once the final goodbyes had been said, she sighed, turned back to her trunk, and then resolutely walked it through the barrier onto the Platform 9 ¾ and to her future as a witch attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Her only fear was what her mother had told her. She wasn't really sure she could make lots of friends, even if it was a new start.

_Kings Cross Station_

_10:30 AM_

Ron Weasley was the youngest son of the latest incarnation of the Weasley Clan. This latest incarnation also happened to go under a different name most of the time. The _Wizard Wonders_ were a well-known and much loved group of superheroes. And while suspicions of family connections were talked about in things like the _Quibbler_, _Teen Witch _magazine, and even the _Daily Prophet_ occasionally, nobody knew that the Wizard Wonders and the Weasley Clan were one in the same.

Ron often wondered why he bothered really. He'd grown up in this life, his parents and older siblings being superheroes, all of them being magical, and the occasional encounter with a super villain of some sort. And now it was his first year at school, at Hogwarts, and they were running late!

All because the super villain known as _Sphinx_ (Really, who names themselves after a creature that does nothing but ask riddles?) had to pop up in Diagon Alley and Mum couldn't leave well enough alone and let the Aurors or just Bill and Dad handle it, no they _all_ had to go! It didn't help that before he could even get his own costume on, Percy, Mum and the twins had taken care of the maniac and all his traps. Now they were stuck in traffic and still half a mile out from the station.

He didn't even have his powers yet, even while his father was promising that they would manifest when he needed them the most, Ron seriously doubted the validity of what a man calling himself the "_Repairman_" had to say to him. The only reason he trained so hard and actually bothered learning how to use the gadgets and gizmo's his father and the twins came up with was so he could go into the hero business as soon as possible. But no... He had to wait for his powers to come in, he had to wait until he could control them, he had to wait until he had a _freaking _Arch-Enemy! It was enough to make a bloke go bonkers, y'know?

It all started back when his dad had just graduated Hogwarts, or so he'd been told by his parents more times than he could count. Just after leaving Hogwarts, instead of going to work for the Ministry of Magic, he went right back to school, but this time at Oxford! Muggle university!

Turns out, it was a turning point for Arthur Weasley and his young wife Molly Prewitt Weasley. They were recruited by the Ministry, but not of Magic, instead the Ministry of Defense took a vested interest in the "mysterious" young genius Arthur and fanned the flames of his intellect. He got his degrees from Oxford in an astounding four years, while Molly took a few courses herself and was likewise picked up by the same people in the Defense Ministry. After graduating Oxford, they were both brought in on a special project, being hosted by England, but funded by an International Operations outfit, called the _Green Knight Project_.

The name had absolutely nothing to do with what they were doing, at least not at first.

To begin with, it was just experimenting and studying genetic and physical adaptations to various types of energy. Not all of the energy was natural, some was supernatural, some magical, some even metaphysical. Eventually, after Bill was born and barely a toddler, a discovery was made, and the project took on a whole new light for Arthur. He'd discovered a new energy wave that when exposed to human tissue, caused specific, evolutionary mutations on the cellular level.

It was still highly experimental and they were no where near human testing, but Arthur was the key to it all. He found the wave and he very soon learned how to manipulate it to give off specific functions, make it able to be harnessed. It was no good as an energy source, but it would push the boundaries of genetic research and biology beyond what anyone else could know.

Then the Generals started to arrive. First it was just for an "observation" then more and more of them, then a hard-lining military business man was stationed as Project Lead. And Arthur's friends among the project left him and his wife a book to read, a story of the King Arthur of Merlin Legends. The story was called "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" and it was all about how Morgana sent a transformed warrior under the guise and appearance as the Green Knight to test the Knights of the Round Table.

King Arthur and the Knights, in the story, could not defeat the Green Knight, and it took Sir Gawain besting the other Knight in a Code of Honor and getting him to admit defeat and retreat to finally best the unstoppable monster of Morgana's. And that's what the Green Knight Project was really all about, creating a super soldier that would be loyal to those at the leash and adhere to a strict code of obedience. While Arthur had been working on the physical mutations, other scientists had been working on brainwashing techniques to make all soldiers exposed to his Bio-Wave absolutely loyal to those in command.

Arthur was nobody's fool, and he did not miss the fact that nobody was saying the soldiers would be loyal to England, King and Country, or even the Royal Army. Over the course of a year, during which Charlie was born, Arthur furthered his experiments with the Bio-Wave technology, while at the same time destroying all traces of his notes and evidence of his experiments, making it so that he really was the only one capable of using the technology.

When Percy was born, they made their move, and the Weasleys destroyed the Green Knight Project and freed the other scientists, all the while making it look like the Ministry of Magic had come in to Obliviate a few random muggles that had learned too much about the magical world. They went to Dumbledore himself to make sure that they would no longer be hunted by those that had spawned the project.

It wasn't until the twins were born that they finally noticed it happening, but because of Arthur's experiments, every member of his family, and their children as a result of it, had been affected by the Bio-Wave. When Bill came home from Hogwarts able to perform feats of strength and endurance that were beyond human, they wondered. When Charlie revealed he could speak to and understand magical creatures and even take on their attributes for a while, they grew concerned. When Arthur started inventing and repairing technology that was more advanced than anything anyone had ever seen and Molly gained super strength and her shouts could shatter cinder blocks and Percy could run just under the speed of sound, they suspected.

But it wasn't until the twins started turning into quadruplets, then sextuplets, and then into a small army of pranksters, they knew for a fact that it wasn't just magic. Their bodies and physiologies had been fundamentally altered and Arthur knew that, after the twins, any more children he and Molly had would also develop bio-kinetic powers. Before that happened though, Dumbledore asked them to join the Order of the Phoenix, and they had to deal with Voldemort and his ilk.

Still, it bothered Arthur, having powers such as theirs, and having to hide it just because they weren't 'natural' magical gifts. Eventually, and after a lot of long, hard talks with Molly, they decided to do something about it, and dressed in simple cloaks and party-masks, they went out and used their powers as freely as they wished, not even bothering to hide from the muggles and letting everybody see them.

They were branded superheroes within a day.

Within a week, they had attracted the attention of both super villains and other superheroes, on top of becoming the stuff of legend amongst the Death Eaters and the Order of the Phoenix. Dumbledore seemed to know something, but he never came outright and said anything, neither to them, nor to anyone else. They even fought Voldemort himself a few times, narrowly escaping whenever it became clear they couldn't beat him otherwise, but they still managed to save a lot of lives.

During this time, Bill was still in Hogwarts, but his powers had been growing stronger, not weaker as his father had hypothesized, and as a result by the time he was in his 7th Year, Bill could hold his own with almost anything out there, and his magical skills were nothing to laugh at either. On a whim, early in his 7th Year, Bill went out and used his powers in public, putting on a ratty cloak and a child's goblin mask. At first he was thought of as a street performer, but when the Death Eaters attacked Diagon Alley while he was "performing", he managed to save a lot of lives and personally captured the full squad of evil wizards. One of the lives he'd saved had, incidentally, been that of Fliptrask, the Bank Manager of Gringotts.

It wasn't until Christmas that Arthur and Molly even knew their eldest son was following in their footsteps and going out as a superhero, let alone one that had strong connections with the Goblin nation. It was actually from the goblins that he received his costume and many of his weapons. Once he graduated Hogwarts, they immediately offered him the "secret identity" of William Weasley, Curse-Breaker for Gringotts. And while he did perform the function, every goblin knew him by another name and the rest of the world knew him as "The _Goblin Warrior_", one of the Wizard Wonders.

Charlie, who'd only graduated the year before, also took up a superhero mantle, about the same time that their parents found out Bill was doing it anyway. He could communicate with and take on the magical abilities of any magical creature that was within his range, even flobberworms. So, when the opportunity came, he went off to help with the dragon preserves in Romania and took the moniker, "The _Dragon Tamer_" as even before he got the job, he somehow always managed to call a dragon to him to aid him in whatever his fight was.

Percy, at the same time that Charlie did, also took up a superhero identity, and chose to name himself after the Messenger of the Greek Gods, "Hermes" god of travelers and speed. Like all the others, as he grew older, his powers matured and grew with him, and he can now run several times the speed of sound, and move at amazing speeds without going into a full run either. Their father grew concerned when Percy's speed continued to increase, until he analyzed his middle child and discovered that along with his powers of super speed, Percy's body was developing adaptations so that it wouldn't tear itself apart whenever he moved too fast.

The Twins... Ron shuddered internally... Everybody and their grandfather dreaded facing the wrath of the _Twin Devils_. To start with, they can overwhelm an enemy with superior numbers in the blink of an eye. And while it's happened, there doesn't seem to be any side-effect if one of their copies gets injured or is even killed. That was a grave concern to their parents for the longest time until the Twins finally sat down and explained that they weren't really copies, but more like clones, and even that wasn't wholly accurate.

And it wasn't just their powers either. Ron himself sometimes borrowed a gadget the Twins had cooked up, usually as a joke, but their activities as superheroes switched the jokes around to potential weapons and restraining devices very quickly. Ron's favorite was the Extendible Ears, a brilliant piece of work that allowed you to hear or listen in on conversations whole rooms away.

Then there was himself, Ronald Bilius Weasley. No powers, barely even any magical talent to speak of, not that great on a broom, and mediocre in his use of his father's and brother's crime stopping devices. He'd been very young when his older brothers all became superheroes. He'd once pieced together a costume for himself and asked to go with them. His brothers all laughed and left without him, while he and Ginny stayed home with a babysitter. Although there was some compensation in that the babysitter, more often than not turned out to be their older cousin Theresa, on their mother's side of the family, although the fact that she had red hair often called that into question. She wasn't a witch herself, but she was fully aware of the magical world, and unfortunately that meant they couldn't get away with a lot with her. Sometimes Ron wondered if she had learned how to scream from their mother, or if it was just something the women of the family inherited.

That just left Ron's, and everyone else's, baby sister, Ginerva Weasley. Thankfully, Ginny's powers hadn't shown up either, otherwise he would feel seriously put down. She was also a year younger than him, so that was another reason to be grateful her powers hadn't manifested either, and why he was going to Hogwarts this year and she had to wait until next year. She'd been pouting all over the place ever since Charlie had handed him the Dragon Tamer's old wand, but he could tell she was sad about him leaving. It wasn't too surprising, since for the past few years, it had just been them at home, but Ron wanted to step up and join in with the rest of the family. He wanted to learn the magic of his wizard inheritance, get his superpowers and go out and start saving the world _today_!

Ginny, on the other hand, was rather content to live in the now, and she didn't bother daydreaming about 'What If' and 'When I'm older' and all that. She trained with him in the same weapons and gadgets, she accepted the same warrior training the Bill gave them whenever he was home, and she made sure Ron did the exercises they all needed to do to maintain their bodies. But she also pointed out the flaws in his logic whenever he did something stupid, she reminded him of the dangers of being a superhero, and she did her best to keep him from losing his temper all of the time over the littlest things.

Suddenly, Ron was wondering who would miss who more, him or Ginny. Then, as he looked at the clock one more time, he realized that it wouldn't make any difference if they missed the train!

TBC...


End file.
